This is my brother Andrew. He was born on July 23, 1979 approximately 25 months before I entered the world. I shared a room with him from the time I was born until the time he moved out, most likely the day he turned 18. At times it was wonderful. When we were probably 3 and 5 years old he got this little keyboard, he wrote a song called "Traffic Jam on My Peanut Butter Sandwich". He played keys and brought down my mother's pots and pans and wooden spoons for me to jam on. We recorded it on our boombox on a blank tape. O how I wish we had that tape still... Other times our cohabitation was miserable. My mother took us to Jazzercise each week at we played while she exercised. One afternoon Andrew was practicing his best Jazzercise moves, and upon my interruption pushed me into my dresser and cracked my head wide open. Blood was everywhere.
Throughout our adolescence our relationship contained similar sentiments. We disagreed about most things, but as I look back I think I secretly looked up to him as my older brother, and he secretly envied me because I had a better relationship with our father and was more well liked in school. He was extremely socially awkward, had few friends, mostly female, was overweight, and picked on a lot at school. Not to mention he did weird stuff, like for some reason he was incapable of properly wearing a sock. Even though it had no bearing on my life, how could someone not do something so simple? The heal of the sock was always on the top of his foot... Argh. I digress... Despite his inability to accomplish simple tasks, he was one of the most original and individual characters I have ever met to this day. There was a brief moment where we actually shared interest in something... Punk Rock. He took me to a Fury 66 show when I was in like 6th grade or something. I ripped all my jeans and thought I was super cool. Then punk got played out. He got really into Indie Rock and I got into Heavy Metal. I don't think we agreed on anything again. He used to torture me with the Cure and Sousxie and the Banshees and then on to newer and more obnoxious Riot Grrrl music. We didn't get along at all. We also happened to hang out in the same place with groups of friends who didn't like each other either. It was not a fun few years... Not to mention this was right about the time he came out openly as a homosexual. But back to that later...
At some point in high school he dropped out, but some how my father never found out... I guess he wasn't the most involved parent. He started hanging around UCSC at the student run radion station, just hanging around and talking to the DJ's and stuff. He eventually somehow convinced the station manager that he was a student and I'm still not sure how, but got a FCC license and had his own show, even though he was a high school senior who hadn't been to school for over a year. At that time he began a profitable new business of developing multiple aliases and opening up BMG accounts and receiving the introductory 8 CD's for 1 cent. I don't think he every paid the 1 cent, but he certainly earned a lot more than that selling them at the local buy/sell/trade music store. He got pretty good. He even signed our neighbors up and waited for the mail to come so he could run over and grab the packages while they were at work... Apparently at some point his two career paths came together one day when Andrew didn't show up for his show and KZSC noticed a large portion of their CD Library missing. Unfortunately this behavior became a pattern in his life.
Our mother passed away in 1989, our family had put her social security death benefits in trust funds for us to be available when we were 18, it was supposed to be fore college. None of us spent it on college. Andrew bought a Volvo station wagon and moved to Pacific Grove, where a group of friends he had met lived. Thus began the next pattern in his life... That of a vagabond. As I mentioned he didn't keep many friends, but the ones he had he was very close with for a while. He'd move in with one of them, hang out for a while, get some sort of part time job, things would be pretty mellow for a while, something dramatic would happen, he would lose his job, get in a fight with his friend, leave, move to a new town and never speak to those people again... Weird. He'd always manage to move back into my room every year or so. It was always annoying. He moved from Monterey to Seattle to Mountain View, back to Seattle, back home to Santa Cruz, to Pittsburgh, Concord, back to Seattle, I think he was in Rohnert Park at some point, then finally he managed to settle in San Francisco, but I think he always wanted to go back to Seattle.
Throughout his ramblings, I began life as a young adult, got jobs, travelled, moved to Mountain View, in the same room he lived in. Probably the most important change in my life as a young adult was my conversion to Christianity. Not for any real reason, but we didn't see or speak with each other for a better part of a year. Upon reconnection I think he was not a little shocked by what had happened in my life. I thought it my responsibility as a zealous young Christian to tell him the error of his homosexual ways. That didn't go over to well. We didn't talk for a while after that.
Eventually he came back around. He had gone to Pittsburgh supposedly to receive a grant to go to school and live with someone he had been internet dating for a while. When he got there things didn't go as planned and he had to spend the last of his money on a cross country bus trip to come back home. He couldn't stay with me at my grandparents, because of a bridge he burned, so my aunt and uncle took him in. He was close enough that we would speak fairly often, he would always teach me something cool about the internet. We still weren't close though. After another bridge burned at my aunt's house, he went back to Seattle, was in a long term relationship, had a steady job, but... Eventually he made it back to San Francisco. At this time in his life, his mental health started deteriorating. He was in and out of mental health facilities and half way houses. I was his next of kin, so I always got the phone call. It sounds weird, but this is how our relationship began to repair itself.
Through this whole process we started talking to each other, also, he started the process of seeking disability benefits so he couldn't leave the state, so that had something to do with it. He got into a half way house in San Francisco and at the time I was studying at SFSU. On my break we would go hang out, or he would come over to the university and sneak into the computer lab and surprise me. I was mature enough as a person to give him the respect he deserved as my older brother, and as a Christian to show him love without condemnation. I think he no longer saw me as an opponent, but finally as a friend. A few months later he finally got approved for SSI, got his own little place, some new clothes, a lot of self esteem, and started the process to get enrolled in school. He was really happy, genuinely. I hadn't seen him like that in a long time. A few weeks later I got a text from him saying he was going to Reno for the weekend. I hate Reno. I told him to be safe.
That following Wednesday I was having a BBQ at the grandparents house and had invited a bunch of friends over. I heard the doorbell ring about an hour before the party was supposed to start, and assumed that someone was just there early. I opened the door and was surprised to find the Mountain View Police officers at the door. Instantly my mind started flashing through everything I have done wrong and how it could have gotten back to me. They asked if they could come inside and told me to sit down. They shared with me that my brother's body was found in his room at Circus Circus in Reno. Apparently he had overdosed on a combination of Oxycontin. It turns out it didn't mix with the antidepressant he was taking and the death was ruled a suicide.
I had to work with the coroner in Reno and make arrangements for his body to be sent down and work the funeral home down here to plan the funeral. Luckily my grandparents were able to help me throughout the entire process.
That was almost 5 years ago now. I can't believe it was that long ago. It doesn't seem like he has been gone that long. There are still times when I don't even realize he isn't. I'll think of a story, or a song will play that will remind me of him and I'll have the urge to text him, then realize I can't. It kind of, well really sucks. A while ago I had a dream that featured my brother Andrew. I don't remember all the details, but I'm pretty sure we shared a room again (why?). I woke up and it seemed so real to me. Again, I felt like I could call him, but I couldn't. Again, the other night I had another dream, and I remember for sure that we were sharing a room again... Me and Abby were married, had Xander, and we were renting this weird little hotel room. Andrew was there with us, in one room. I'm not sure what that means, I hated sharing a room with him. It was seriously horrible. Maybe I secretly miss that. Hmmm...
But anyways, after I woke up I started thinking about how much I really did miss him, and how much it hurt not to have him in my life anymore. I thought of this verse from 1 Corinthians 15:55:
"O Death, where is your sting?
O Grave, where is your victory?”
I believe what this is saying. We have access to eternal life through Jesus' substitutionary death on the cross and through Jesus' resurrection from the dead, death was conquered and no longer has power over us. There will be a day when there will be no more death, no more pain, no more tears. But that day isn't here yet. Right now, death stings, and my brother is still in the grave. I still feel the pain and suffering that comes with losing a loved one. Nevertheless I hold out hope that by the incomprehensible mercies of God I may see my brother again, and if nothing else, that I may never have to feel the feeling of losing a loved one to death again.
On another note, here is a short sermon highlighting how I deal with the pain of loss:
