For Ross

Today is the day I invite my feelings to the surface and try to write of my brother who died April 9, 2006. To do this is so hard that I have put it off for three months, to the day, all the while knowing I needed to write out my tribute to him, both for me and for him. So here goes.
So many memories--riding bikes, scraping knees, walking two miles to school over gravel roads, through wind, sun and snow, swinging high on the huge big kids’ swing, tossing the ball over the school in Annie-I-over (so much an oral tradition I don’t really know how to spell it correctly), sinking in the snow banks and chinking the little log cabin replica with leafy chunks to keep the wind out–all memories of my childhood and all with the certain safety of having my brother, Ross, there.
And again, as we grew older, early morning skating sessions at the arena to pass my first figures test, rides to Burlington to watch him practice endlessly and tirelessly to reach that next hurdle, sharing his car as he drove us to school while he went to work at the bank, going to Fort Erie, Guelph, Banff, many, many places to watch him and his partner compete in ever higher skating competitions. All of it fun, all of it so much a secure and happy part of my growing up. My big brother was always there for me.
He taught me to drive. Of course driving for him was pure ecstasy and he wanted me to share the thrill. In his ‘57 Chevy we reached the world. No place was too far, no goal too hard. For Ross, as for Birney’s David, ‘mountains were made to see over.’ He learned to fly both literally and figuratively. Money was always tight but he found a way to pay for the lessons and for the flying hours required. It was the way he lived his life. Whenever he had an idea he went about finding the way to make it happen, seldom set back by anything. The word indomitable was his mantra and his nature.
When he got the word that his brain held a tumor, he told me that young though he was, he had no regrets. He had lived a great life, done so many thrilling things that if he were to die tomorrow, it was enough. Yet the words were drowned by his actions once again. He fought like he had never fought before. He attacked the problem, he learned all he could about his blastoma, he blasted at it with foods, with traditional and alternative medicine, he agreed to do chemo and radiation, and he won for over a year and half, even though he had been given only three to six months to live.
When the cancer came back and he was told there was no hope, still he fought. He expected to beat it as he had so many other obstacles his whole life. His concern was for his family and for his many friends. He comforted me the day that, upon visiting, I realized in my gut that he was dying. His tears which I only saw that one time were for how sad I was. He couldn’t bear to see me cry.
And so when I visited from then on, I tried so hard to be brave, to be funny, to sing, to laugh, to tell him stories of my kids and my hubby, anything to keep from thinking about the monster that was stalking all of us. I could not think of my life without my big brother to share ideas with, to laugh with, to get excited with, to just be with.
When he finally died after weeks of lying immobile and unable to speak, with only his eyes showing he was with us, I was relieved that he was released from that still prison, but I put off thinking about the fact that I would never see him again. And I am still putting it off. I have a picture of the two of us on my desk as I write this–we are posing with our arms around each other but he is giving the V for victory sign over my head. And we are laughing. Always laughing. That is the way I will remember him, one arm so firm and strong a support and the other creating humor in every situation. And when I listen in my head I can still hear his full-throated joyful laugh. May it ever be with me.