Category — Family

Today is his birthday.

One whole year has passed, and I’m still drunk with love every time I look at him, smell him, touch him, drink him up. He’s all eyelashes and fuzzy butter-soft skin, contented smiles and feet and hands on my breast when he feeds. I can’t remember how I breathed before him.

I wish I had documented it better, every day of our lives together, because it’s so hard for me to believe that it really happened. Smiles and teeth and claps and baby steps and first words and holy hell, where does the time go?

I’m not the same person I was a year ago. Everything is different, easier and harder. Fifty pounds smaller on the outside, and fifty pounds heavier on the inside, right up top under my ribcage. I’m happier and and richer and poorer and so much more exhausted. I have a child and I feel like a child, I’m all grown up and responsible and clueless. I have a purpose and a reason, but less direction. I’m thirsty and I’m full. Everything is different and I don’t know where it’s going or where I’m going, but I know that it’s all for him, for our family. I’ll figure it out, I’m figuring it out as I go one step at a time.  I’m not the same person I was a year ago.

I’m his mama.

I remember every time he wakes up from a deep sleep and cries out for me, for comfort and a snuggle. I remember every time he turns around and stops what he’s doing to smile at me, just to make sure I’m still here. He makes me sing and he makes me dance and he throws his head back when I dip him. He’s my baby, my big boy, my handsome lovie.

I’ve been thinking about my brother a lot lately. I think it’s been over a year since I’ve seen him, or close to it, anyway.

Josh is the smartest person I know. He started building computers in the 80s, when he was in elementary school. For fun. When he was at school, he was a hot commodity. My mom would show up in the office to pick him up for appointments and what not, and nobody would know where he was. He would be all over the building fixing the teachers’ computers. This was before school systems had tech people; they used to come get him out of class to help them.

He knows everything there is to know about hardware, software and networking. He’s completely self-taught; I used to get so frustrated, because the material that I was trying so hard to learn in college just came naturally to him. I don’t think anything has ever come to me that easily.

From the time he was little, he’d been building and wiring things. Legos and Construx were his best friends. When he was about 10, a trip to the county fair changed his life. He was stuck on top of the Double Ferris Wheel for almost two hours, I think. Our folks were freaked out, but Josh was in heaven. Those two hours changed his life. From that point on, it was all about carnival rides for him. He would spend hours, days, building these rides out of Construx. Then, he would wire them to a transformer and add lights and movement through the joints of the toys. It was amazing. He had created miniature replicas, sometimes 4 feet tall.

Life wasn’t ever easy for him. He was bored in school, so they tried their hardest to label him with a learning disability. They said he needed counseling. Really, he was smarter than all of them, and they didn’t know what to do with him. He powered through that with support from our parents, but it didn’t get easier. He was different. Kids used to make fun of him, because they didn’t understand him either. There were a few times in our life where I was the one defending my big brother. (I once backhanded a neighbor kid across the face; his dad pulled him to our doorstep in a Radio Flyer so that my mom could see the hand print I had left on his face. He deserved it.)

He got through junior high with a struggle, and then came high school. And freedom. And a car. He met some true friends who loved him for who he was, and I think that’s how he got through high school. His summers, of course, were spent at the county fair. For the first three weeks in August, we didn’t see him unless we went looking for him.

He had no plans to go to college after graduation; it just didn’t interest him. After 12 years of being bored, being misunderstood, being forced to learn things that he already knew or wasn’t interested in, why volunteer for four more years? I can understand his logic, and his decision. So that summer after graduation in 1995, he left with the fair and the carnival rides. Nothing else has ever made him that happy.

I think what he loved about the fair and the carnival rides was the fact that he could do something that he truly loved to do, that made other people happy. People were waiting in line for him to show them a good time. And it was satisfying to him.

He’s never been concerned with material things, ever. A paycheck doesn’t mean anything if he’s not happy earning it. And if he’s doing something he loves, he’ll do it for free, or for a trailer to live in or a car to sleep in. Sometimes he would come home at the end of the season without any clothes but the ones on his back, and his shoes would have holes in the bottoms of them. But he was happy. I’ve always accepted this with love and amazement; how can you not be proud of someone who only wants to be happy, and make other people happy?

I don’t ever talk about my brother, because I’m too afraid of what other people think. There’s so much judgment, and too many stereotypes, and I don’t think I can handle what people will say. The truth is that he’s a carny, but that’s just a word. He knows everything about everything. He has a huge heart, and a great sense of humor. He loves music and animals. He makes the best homemade spaghetti sauce in the world. I’m lucky if I see him once a year. And I’m lucky he’s my big brother.

Originally published on November 26, 2007

When my sister-in-law was pregnant with my niece, her first daughter after three sons, I had a talk with my nephew Ben. Bear with me, because this was almost two years ago, but totally memorable. While I may ad lib a tad,  I swear I didn’t make it up.

It was kind of like this.

S: Hey Ben, it’s so exciting that you’re going to be a big brother, don’t you think?

B: Yeah. I guess.

S: You’re going to have this little baby sister, and she’s going to be like a princess that you’ll always be able to protect, like you’re her knight.

B: …

S: Well, I was a little girl with a big brother, and I can tell you that’s it’s pretty cool.

B: You have a big brother?

S: Mmm hmm!

B: Wait, I know who it is! It’s Uncle Mark! You guys are ALWAYS together!

S: …

Sarah: 0, Ben: 1

.:.:.:.:.:.

I love that kid, he has such a pure heart. When Asher was tiny, Ben would sing to him whenever he cried. And that vocabulary… He’s the only child I have ever seen speak French before his second birthday.

I think he likes me pretty well, too. Although it wasn’t always mutual. He loves his Uncle Mark, to whom I was clearly a distraction. Once when I came to visit, Ben said, “Uncle Mark, your FRIEND SARAH is here.” When Mark and I got engaged, Ben’s mom said to him, “Ben, when Uncle Mark and Sarah get married, do you know what we’ll call Sarah then? She’ll become Aunt Sarah.” And Ben said with disgust, “GROSS. I don’t even LIKE ants.”

.:.:.:.:.:.

Mark and I were married three years ago today. It’s been almost perfect, always worth it. We’re living and learning together, adulthood and parenthood, figuring it out as we go. I wouldn’t trade a second of it.

He is all my reasons.

Yes, I realize I just posted this picture a couple weeks ago. Shut up. Also, check out that viking beard. RRROW.

If I could open my arms
And span the length of the isle of Manhattan,
I’d bring it to where you are
Making a lake of the East River and Hudson
If I could open my mouth
Wide enough for a marching band to march out
They would make your name sing
And bend through alleys and bounce off all the buildings.

.: Death Cab for Cutie: Marching Bands of Manhattan