What appears below is my truth. Those of whom I speak of are not here to defend their actions. All that remains are the ashes of the past. This is dark and sad. Be Warned.

Brother;

You don’t know this about me, as you chose to know nothing about me, but I am almost completely ruled by music. It helps my mood, picks me up when I am down, helps me express my rage in the moment, helps me cope and gives me hope. This point is something I will come back to in a bit. It was just so sad you chose to know so little about me.

You saw me as a fat ass and that was your nickname for me for most of my life ‘FA’. It was something you said all the time, even in casual conversation with Mom and Dad. They never corrected you or asked you to be nicer they just accepted you saying it, I guess at least they figured you were talking to them so they were grateful for that. I don’t know where you anger came from. I carry this shameful experience in the basement when we watched the Eddie Murphy movie ’48hrs’ and I repeated to you one of the more crass lines and you broke from me. We had been playfully fighting and rolling around on that ugly gold shag carpet; just the two of us with Mom and Dad off somewhere else. I remember it so vividly as it was the last time we had contact of the playful kind. After that there was only violence. Did I do that? Was my repeating that dialogue what did it? Caused you to lose your kindness and become this angry person? Or did you really have some kind of mental disorder that popped out there for a moment and then retreated like you did? I blame myself for the fact that Mom felt responsible for renting that movie and she shamed herself and us for enjoying it as it was adult and certainly not for kids. She held that for so long. And evidently so did I. Shame and fear were big in our house. Keep quiet so the neighbors don’t hear. God forbid we have issues. Keep your anger and your tears to yourself and do not express it. I spent my childhood trying to live up to the smart kid, a grade or two ahead of me, who shared my last name that and was so smart. I guess I began believing that I was lesser in everyone’s eyes somehow even then. I don’t remember doing super well in Elementary school, except in the special ed program that they insisted I needed. Turns out we were working at a much higher level in that class, it was just more one on one. Someone paid direct attention to me and I did well. Imagine that! I remember waking up writing freehand and showing my first poem to Mom and her saying – ‘Where did you copy this from? It is wrong to steal someone else’s words’. But they were my words, not someone else’s. Remember how Mom used to say, Marc is the smart one, Linda is gonna get through school if it kills us. What a bitch. None of you knew me or the potential I could have had. None of you gave me the chance to be who I could have been.

I remember being terrified when Mom forced me to wash my hair in the kitchen sink, forcing me under the faucet and the soap running in my eyes. Truth be told I didn’t take showers as you know because I was afraid of the water, afraid of drowning or choking or whatever my tiny child mind feared at the time. So she grabbed me and forced my head under the water while I cried. I managed to get away, falling off the kitchen counter from where I had been pinned upside down and backwards, laying face up under the faucet. I ran into the dining room screaming as she yelled at me to come back and what did you do? You took a picture of me as you howled with laughter. I still have it somewhere. Dark and shadowy, this picture, I am almost doubled over crying, screaming for help that would not come. How the kids on the street loved to tease me about my greasy hair. I mean she did bathe me or maybe I did, so my body was clean but my hair never was. By the way, what were you doing all those hours you would spend in the bathroom when I was sick or otherwise needing use the bathroom?. You would spend afternoons just hanging out in the there knowing I was in agony on the other side of the door. Or you would lock the door somehow and leave it unoccupied with only you being able to get back in. Even Mom and Dad were without in those cases but they never said anything to you about it. You seemed to relish the pain and suffering you caused, like a true sadist.

You didn’t really play outside with the other kids. The occasional baseball game or road hockey in the street where you would always be the hitter or at least in charge. You were always in control and making the other kids chase after the ball down the road. I got to do the ‘commercial breaks’. Walking across the road as cars approached, making sure the other kids were out of harm’s way. That one time that you hit that kid Chris in the head with the baseball bat, I remember that. In your defense you had told him not to stand behind you repeatedly but he was being cheeky and kept doing it. So, you swung the bat full bore and cracked his head. Remember his Liverpool, England Popeye-esque father came charging out of the house to kick your butt and our Mom came out to your aid. They argued in the street and no punishment ensued. But wasn’t that the truth of you whole childhood? You did what you wanted when you wanted. We ate the meals you wanted to eat, watched the TV you wanted to watch. My clothes were your hand-me-downs into my teens, even though I was a girl and built differently. We even stopped going to church then. I remember getting a get well card in the mail because I guess Mom and Dad had told people I was sick and that was why we weren’t coming anymore. I kept that card for a long time always wanting to ask why I got it but I just couldn’t bring my child self to ask. You said you didn’t believe in God. I guess that meant that none of us did either.

I remember playing Monopoly and Gin Rummy with you and Dad. It always ended up with you yelling and freaking out running out of the room. Or winning and gloating for days about how much better you were than me. Again, no reprimand or correction from Dad. Don’t get me wrong. I know I was a drama queen and I know that a temper tantrum was my go to. As I got older it was easier to see that you were doted on, treated with kid gloves and ultimately became what I referred to as the golden child. You could do no wrong. And heaven forbid I said something negative about you to Mom or Dad. I have told a few people about you shoving me up against the wall holding an Xacto knife to my throat while Dad pushed passed you in the hall. That was when I knew for sure that I was helpless in that home. When you let me go and I ran to the car I was crying and asked Dad why he hadn’t done anything and he told me that I shouldn’t have been in the hall when you were. Your moods only became worse as you grew older. You were a sore loser and you made your anger apparent to everyone in that house.

Just recently when we were cleaning out Mom’s stuff I found a letter I wrote. It wasn’t meant to be seen by the family I don’t think. It was simply me expressing a wish to be in a place that was not so hostile. I listed the injustices I experienced and maybe hoped by writing it I could release it. I must have only been a kid when I wrote it. The handwriting is young for sure. But she kept it. In her dresser drawer. Why? Did she think it was funny? Sad? Stupid? I will never know. How many holidays and birthdays did you ruin with your selfishness? I used to think these were all complaints that any sibling would have. Years later neighbors would ask how I survived you. Remember all the birthday and Christmas gifts I bought for you? Things I thought you would like and year after year of trying to find a way back to you. You would see they were from me and either toss them unopened behind you in a dusty pile or just trash them in front of me without opening them. Eventually I did give up on that. You lived off Mom and Dad for way longer than you should have. You were smart but terrified of the world I think and that is why you never did anything with your life. You had a lot of talent on the golf course and with computers. You built that website for somewhat famous jazz band Manteca – that could have been turned into something but you pissed just the opportunity away.

Remember the night Mom tried to stand up to you when you are Dad were going somewhere? I just remember standing at the top of the landing at the front door and watching you grab her by her arm and shove her to the wet ground while Dad continued to get in the car. What power you had huh? When they started taking you on trips and leaving me at home to be cared for by relatives I thought that was normal. And I was grateful for the break from you. I could sleep in and not be afraid that you would turn your stereo on full blast and go outside to work on something. I couldn’t work on anything, study or anything because you knew I needed quiet and you took advantage of the opportunity to be a dick. Remember the day you tried to break my bedroom door down with a golf club? The hole it made stayed in that door the rest of the years that I lived in that room. It was like a constant reminder of your rage and the constant danger I was in.

Mom and Dad took you on solo trips to California, Las Vegas, and Dad took you to Myrtle Beach, just the two of you, for years. I stayed home. Looking back it makes me sad that I was denied these trips but in some ways I don’t mind because I have been to California and Las Vegas both on my own and with Derek and had a way better time than I would have with your moody ass. Aunt Carol, who you visited in California, told me years later that you were a dick to her too when you visited. The typical stuff, not talking, being rude and angry, demanding certain foods and getting them or throwing a tantrum (while in your 20s no less) and just not being appreciative of the gift of being there. I felt bad, when she told me, for Mom and Dad. We did take a few family trips together. Florida, Cape Cod, the Eastern Townships of Quebec, to see the Grandparents. When we drove you always had shotgun. When we flew we never sat near each other, always me with Mom and you with Dad several rows apart. Different hotel rooms with the same set up. I do have one eerie memory of laying under a bed in Cape Cod at Grandma’s house, middle of the day, crying and repeating ‘I am a good girl’ ‘I am a good girl’. Grandma found me, I remember that too but I have no idea what the circumstances were around that. Perhaps my brain is shielding me from something.

One time in the basement of our house we were both down there and I called you a Zit head. Stupid thing to say as the acne was your most major flaw that you had no control over. I managed to get to the laundry room before you caught me and sat against that door while you tried to tear it down. I swear four angels held it closed to save me from what surely would have been my last day if you had managed to get it open. It was some kind of blessing that you didn’t. You did succeed another time in crushing my hand onto a chain link fence where my finger got stuck and I ripped it away scrapping the bone and leaving me with a pretty nasty scar even today. The time you stabbed me in the thumb with a steak fork and Mom had to pry it from the table as it went right through. The time you broke my arm when I was half way out of the car and you slammed my door. The endless bruises and scratches. But Mom told people I was clumsy and in my state of survival even I believed that. Remember when I broke my leg and you told Mom I was faking? How many other violent incidents have I blocked out do you think?

Suffice to say at some point your behavior got away from Mom and Dad and they eventually had no way to rein you in. I had worked on forgiving them for your behavior for a long time but I see now that I still carry so much of it with me. I want that to stop and I want to be rid of the narcissist bricks that you are to me, that I carry on my soul. I always say that I think they did the best they could with what they knew but I want to say now something different than that. They could have done better. They could have cared about their two kids and not just the one. They made this mistake of letting you metastasize over the years into this angry beast. Even in death your obit called you a gentle giant. What a laugh. You were not that. It is easy to say you were accessible to your friends when you don’t have any. How many close friends did you have? One? Two? How many people did you matter too besides Mom and Dad? But people see what they want to see and in the eyes of the world you had to be that for them no matter how untrue it was. Funny no one wrote in the condolence book but Dad’s friends. And one girl who said she liked the chocolate chip cookies you used to bring to Elementary school. Wow, what a legacy you leave.

When the pit bull attacked Sam and I, sitting on the front lawn on that warm September evening. I just remember separating from my body and standing on a few driveways away watching myself scream. Apparently, you came out and beat the crap out of the pit bull and it let go of Sam. Then you punched the brick wall breaking your hand. I had nightmares about incident that for decades after the fact. I felt so responsible but I need to let that go. All I did was take the dog for a walk and come home and sit outside. Some other irresponsible person let their dog out without knowing it and he attacked our dog. This was not my fault. This was not my fault. This was not my fault.

When I started dating Kevin, he was the very first boy to show me any kind of affection. He hit me the first time two months into our relationship. I think I wanted to fix him, and make him a better person. I think I wanted to understand the pain he was in that caused him to hit me, verbally abuse me, take advantage of me. I couldn’t save you and honestly, at that point you were not even an afterthought. I just wanted to be away from all of you. I was 18. Getting out of that house was my goal I think ever since you held that blade to my neck and no one said anything about it. But I also gravitated towards a person who hurt me and I stayed because I wanted to fix him. He loved me he said and I wanted that to be true because no one had ever said that to me. Dad later told me that you would have kicked Kevin’s ass if either of them had known. I doubt that. Wholeheartedly. When I finally had enough and wanted to leave him, I asked Mom for help and she refused me. “You made your bed” she said. I had just come back from my first solo California trip at 26ish and Mom and Dad picked me up at the airport. I remember how Dad gripped the wheel when I said the words that I was leaving him. Mom had told me throughout my seven years in that abusive relationship not to tell Dad about what was going on. And I never did. Together for seven years, married for two and Dad was mad that I was leaving Kevin. I made up an excuse as to why I was leaving, I don’t even remember what it was. But I did ask for help in moving back and was shut down. So, I took what I could carry and forty bucks. I lost so much of myself and my things in that move but I told myself they were just things that could be replaced and that even if they couldn’t be at least I was free of him.

I had a pretty wild year after that. I was pretty reckless with my body, giving it unprotected to anyone who asked and really just hoping to die. You don’t let random strangers pick you up and take you to their homes without telling anyone, unless you have a death wish. But none of the three of you gave a damn. I was essentially blacklisted after the divorce. I was not allowed to come by the house, my childhood home, unless I called first and made an arrangement to see someone. I had to relinquish my key when I got married and moved out. You had ripped my bedroom apart pretty much right after I left to get married and it was made clear to me that I was not welcome back. I thought it was forever with this guy so I didn’t mind at the time. Remember when Nana was dying and Mom wanted you to drive her to see her dying mother at the hospital and you refused? And you refused to let her use HER car because she was a smoker. You got her car even though she worked so hard to buy it. She let you have it and you took it over, I don’t know that you ever let her drive it after that. Anyway, she had to call me to take her and I had just taken two sleeping pills as it was first thing in the morning and I was working nights at the time. I drove over and took her and she saw her mother. While you lounged at home. Stuff like that was normal. No one ever called you on it. Then Dad got sick. Prostate Cancer. I couldn’t bring myself to visit. Between seeing you and the shame of being divorced, how could I? Dad didn’t talk to me for almost three years as a result of that. I moved to Calgary with Derek. Mom and Dad came out once to see me. For four days over a weekend. Just so happened you got sick the week before so they left a bit early in case you needed them. But Mom brought me a gift from home. She brought me a paper bag with a silhouette of a dog on it. Dad gave Derek aluminum salt and pepper shakers that were made from beer cans and had the Maple Leafs logo on it. And then they left early in case you might need something.

Dad had been retired for a bit at that point and Mom was about to retire I think. Dad spent the next 10 years carting you to this appointment and that. Remember that one birthday of Mom’s that you asked her to recite all your medications and she couldn’t do it so you stopped talking to her for two or three years? Remember how she cried about that? Begging you to forgive her for that injustice. Remember also, when you told her that she was the reason you had Cancer, because she smoked? Mom told me that you told Dad that you had nightmares where demons were trying to rip your soul from your body. I believe in that kind of stuff and if I could see it happening to anyone, I could see it happening to you. I have been so afraid to say all of this for so long. The facade they created was flawless. Everyone with enough distance from you believed you were who Mom and Dad made you out to be. Those closer to you got a better picture. Your best friend of 20+ years stopped talking to you. You said it was because of the Cancer, I think it was because he wanted to spend time with his soon to be wife and you didn’t want to compete so you threw a tantrum. He won’t tell me now so I do not know. Your next best buddy, the reclusive albeit gentle person you were close to got married too and when Dad offered him a bunch of your stuff after you died, he declined because his wife could not stand you, perhaps she could see what you were at your core. She didn’t want any of your negativity in her house. That hurt Dad. I felt bad that the delusion of who he thought you were was so clouded against who you really were that he could just not understand her reaction. But I totally understood it and I think other people did too.

When you were sick Mom called me one day at work and told me to get on a plane and come out because you needed a transplant. She was ticked at Derek because he tried to get her to ask me when I got home as opposed to the middle of the workday. But we spoke and she told me that my choice was to get on a plane and come save you or understand that I was no longer a part of the family. To say that now makes me think – how would that really have affected my life? But as the weeks passed and my best friend and husband told me not to, I got tested to see if my blood could be used to replace your poison blood. A Stem Cell transplant. This would mean a series of injections of a fairly new chemical drug to increase my stem cells followed swiftly by 8-12hrs for me of dialysis for four days. Caveat for me being they have not really studied the drug or its effect on the donor. But risks were involved for sure. Now, about a decade and a half later, they know that it can cause leukemia in donors. If it had been a success you would have gotten three more years. Maybe. If it wasn’t a success it may kill you on the spot. (talk about daughter non- grata) or make you sicker or have no effect. So, I went and held my best friend Rita’s hand and got tested. She cried with Derek about it. I told them that I was a 100% match after hearing the odds were about 75% that we wouldn’t be a match at all. You never got strong enough to get my blood. But the lady at the place where you were getting treated called me like she was a collection agent looking for me to pay a bill calling me all the time, day and night telling me to get on that plane and get out there just in case. Imagine what it is like to know that your life is not your own. I am here for parts in their eyes. There was no care or concern for what this might mean for my health. Not to mention the fact that I was living a life free of all of this drama with a job and best friends and a husband. None of that mattered. If Marc was sick I was on deck to save you. And I remember Dad saying, ‘don’t expect any special treatment’ from them if I did do it, Marc was family and it was understood that I would do it regardless of anything. And since I was allergic to tomatoes at the time I would have to work on curing myself before the transplant because Marc likes tomatoes and would not be happy without them in his diet. Are you fucking kidding me? Nope they were not kidding. I told Mom that I had a choice to say no and I think I could hear all the blood draining from her face. She then reiterated the point that I would be outcast forever if that was the case.

When you died, I did cry and I stood my master bathroom and said a bunch of things to you. Then I sat on my bed and read the Jewish prayer for the dead. You had two grand mal seizures that the nurses said made it look like something was trying to drag your soul from your body. Then I remembered what Mom said about your dreams. No one was with you when you died. The ambulance took you and Dad followed in after a while. You died alone in a sterile room, surrounded by strangers who saw people like you every day. You were dragged from your body by the soul but to where? You had no funeral, no visitation. You didn’t want one. Mom didn’t even go to the funeral home to say goodbye. Just Dad. He was surprised your face hair had come in a bit because you were always so fussy about being clean shaven. It had just grown in after you died. Dad was broken by your death. Mom was a mess after. The next four years Dad was a shell of himself having lost his best friend, then his heart attacked him and he was gone too. You and Dad did have good times together and for that I guess I am grateful. I wrote a poem about your death for Dad, in my words, and he carried that piece of paper with him until he died. You would have hated that. That makes me smile. Aunt Carol cried when she read it, after Dad emailed it to her. She knew who you really were. She thought it was good of me to think of you fondly for Dad. But I did it for him not you. In many ways Mom died when you did. She got sicker, less motivated, stayed sat on the couch. She told me you let her hold your hand the day you died. Even though she still had not named your medication for the Cancer. At that point you still were not speaking to her. She held your hand as your headache worsened. Dad took you back to bed and you never woke up at home again. They kept your ashes in the urn on your chair in the basement for a few years before interring it. You are all together there again now and I made a point of saying in Mom’s obit that she had been reunited with her beloved son. I found a picture of the three of you on your graduation from high school all dressed up and put it in front of her ashes and Dads. Now you can be together there forever with them both. I don’t know if you were how you were because you had a mental illness or if you were just this side of evil.

I think about it now and it’s not surprising to me that I feel weak, stupid, fat, useless, unlovable, unwanted, undeserving, even to this day. It’s not surprising that I hide. Don’t share my talent gifts for singing or writing with many. If I read a story about someone like me I would not be surprised to know they had a drug or alcohol problem. That they lived on the street or were dead at their own hand. Or that they themselves had taken the lives of the family that cast them out. I think it is by God’s grace alone that I am still here, still fighting, still thriving. I had to fight my own family’s perception of myself to evolve. I always say that everything I have today, I have because I fought for it and got it myself. Who would have known I would be the strong one, the one who would survive it all and you all.
 
Words have always meant a lot to me. And music. This song makes me think of you. I am not being mushy here. Philadelphia by Bruce Springsteen for all the walking you did in the months leading up to your death. I wonder were you trying to walk away from your anger or the poor life you wasted?

Philadelphia by Bruce Springsteen
I was bruised and battered, I couldn’t tell what I felt.
I was unrecognizable to myself.
Saw my reflection in a window and didn’t know my own face.
Oh brother are you gonna leave me wastin’ away
On the streets of Philadelphia.
I walked the avenue, ’til my legs felt like stone,
I heard the voices of friends, vanished and gone,
At night I could hear the blood in my veins,
It was just as black and whispering as the rain,
On the streets of Philadelphia.
Ain’t no angel gonna greet me.
It’s just you and I my friend.
And my clothes don’t fit me no more,
A thousand miles
Just to slip this skin.
Night has fallen, I’m lyin’ awake,
I can feel myself fading away,
So receive me brother with your faithless kiss,
Or will we leave each other alone like this
On the streets of Philadelphia.