In Which the Little Brother Begins His Two-Year Hiatus

It happened. I gave the Little Brother a giant hug yesterday, told him goodbye, and that was it. I've sent my kid brother off to do and learn hard things. When I see him again he'll be a man.

Not man enough, I hope, that he won't giggle with me while we lay on my parents bed where Pa is sleeping (in our defense he wasn't sleeping when we first got there) and we torture each other with Pa's back scratcher. This may or may not have been how we spent the last night together. Who knew a back scratcher could do so much damage? Also, we were whooped. We had buckets of unfinished business to attend to. I love the Little Brother, but attending to necessary preparations is not his strong point. In our home, whooped = super loopy, meaning that our giggles in relation to the back scratcher were louder and lasted longer then they would have otherwise. Don't worry. Pa slept through it all just fine. He was whooped, too.

It is strange to think of the next two years without him. I know two years will pass crazy fast, but where I'm standing now it feels like forever. I can only imagine what it must feel like for him.

For the most part, the Little Brother is laid back and easy going (leading to his seeming inability to get things done, as mentioned above). He's been pretty chill about this two-year hiatus thing. There was only one time when I thought he might be overwhelmed by emotion. It was the evening before he left. A couple of amazing men had come to our home to talk with the Little Brother about what he was about to do. It wasn't long after they got there before the Little Brother's face became taut, his jaw set and his cheek muscles tight and his mouth in a hard, straight line. It's a face I've never seen on him before but I recognized it because that's my emotion face. The face I make when I have so much emotion in me that if I crack even the least bit it will come flooding out and there will be no stopping it or reeling it in until it's had a nice, long romp.

The Little Brother and I are most like each other than we are like any of our other siblings. I forget that sometimes. The Little Brother and I are different enough on the surface I forget how similar we are underneath.

I'm going to miss this little guy. Technically I shouldn't be calling him little since he's been significantly bigger than me for years. But to me, he'll always be the Little Brother.