blogwithvalor

My brother passed away January 11th.

The title and the one line above this, that was the extent of what I could write on January 30th when I started this post. It was all still so fresh that I couldn’t calm my mind down enough to put down any thoughts. I debated even making a post about it.

But it is the biggest loss of my life. So, I want to say a few things.

Growing up with siblings is a beautiful experience. You learn what it means to share space with other people your age. You get to experience the world with others that are on your level. My brother was only a year younger than me and that meant that so much of what we did was done at the same time. Every sport and hobby we did as kids was at the same time. We learned karate together, we played T-ball together, we were in gymnastics together, and we even started learning guitar at the same time. It made sense to us to just do everything together.

Then you get older and you start growing apart. We found the things we were good at or wanted to be good at. My brother, Champion, really found himself in music and I had a knack for pattern recognition, leading me into math and science. We were entering different worlds. So as time went on, we drifted further and further apart. We were brothers and we were part of our family. So, we were never that far from one another, but that codependent bond that siblings form as kids became weaker and weaker as time went on. By the time we became adults, his life and mine didn’t intersect that often.

Our family always brought us together and he had two beautiful children that I love with all my heart. But we didn’t call each other or even text really. Maybe it is a leftover from the fights we used to get into as kids, but we honestly grew out of those and really had a good long time as loving brothers throughout our teenage years and early 20s. Whatever the reason, we just didn’t communicate that much in the last decade.

When I really think about it, personally, I just always thought there’d be time. I pictured a future where we were old and hung out sharing stories as older men. I’d come to his kids’ events and share time with him. We would get together at my parents and share a meal. In my mind, there was always time to get those moments back, to regrow our relationship. Tomorrow was always a possibility.

Now, every single one of those possibilities are gone. I can’t look forward to mending a strained relationship. Those future conversations won’t happen. It hurts that those things I once thought possible are gone. It hurts that I looked forward to those.

I did spend his last weeks with him. He was in the hospital and then hospice. It was like skipping all the painful conversations and growth, and jumping right to the point of showing someone unconditional love. We didn’t have time for any of it. Our family took care of him. His friends visited. I cried hearing him play music for the last time with them. It was some of the hardest and most beautiful moments of my life.

We both knew we loved each other in the end and forever I will carry a part of him with me.

…

Champion was a creative soul, musically and artistically. He was one of those people that picked up instruments and fiddled with them for a day and before you knew it, was writing original music with them. He recorded so many songs.

Our father is an artist and Champ really followed in his footsteps. There are more drawings he’s done around his family’s home than I can count. He’s sculpted, painted, and even burned portraits into wood with a magnifying glass.

He could be scatter brained and forgetful, but when you were with him, he gave you his full attention. He may not agree with you, but he was there in the conversation with you. If you shared part of yourself with him, he would always listen and show general interest even if it was something he didn’t know or otherwise care about. You cared about it and that made him care about it. There are few people like that in the world and I’m so happy to have found that in my brother.

I love you, Champ.