The Brothers Parramazov

...a continuation of 'I'm no Denzel Washington'

My brothers and sister taught me most of what I know about what it takes to be a quality human. Not even an exceptional one, or a successful one—but a quality one. I am grateful for that.

I think the sibling relationship is fascinating. Really one of the most impressive accomplishments in our brief history of human existence. I make that statement never having been to Harry Potter World in Orlando, so take it with a grain of salt.

I love my brothers and sisters, and they really love me. It’s weird. I mean, of course the parent-child relationship is special, but I can think of reasons why it is. It can sort of be explained, and explanation always seems to be a natural diluter of awe—to no fault of its own. Maybe unless you are dealing with scientific theory or whatever. Otherwise, mysteries are just inherently more powerful.

This is how I would explain the power of the parent-child relationship:

My mother and father created me. They donated a part of themselves so I could exist—great sacrifice involved. There is also lot of responsibility born in this sacrifice. I owe them a lot, and they owe a lot to me. It was a gift for them to create me; that is definitely how I feel about it. Therefore, I owe them at least a semblance of some sort of ambition. I cannot just find a beach and lie down until I sink into the wet sand and die. That would be disrespectful. I owe my parents quite a bit, ever since they gifted me with this life.

But there also might be this force working the other way, one that says I did not have a choice in my own creation. It was their decision—which I never got an opportunity to veto—so they at least should give me some support along the way, as I navigate a maze they threw me into. That support comes in many shapes, the most important of which might just be love. I’m not a parent, so this could be way off base. It’s probably not as simple and certainly not as meritocracy-fueled as my interpretation suggests. Love does not follow rules of reason. I get that, and I don’t want to play that down, but I’m just trying to set the stage for an interesting point about me and my siblings.

The nature of the relationship between siblings is not logical. My siblings really owe nothing to me. They have little reason to be so vested in my life. They will benefit very little from my well-being—not in a directly personal way. There is no biological motivation to make sure I reproduce and pass on offspring or whatever, like there is from a parent. We do share DNA, but only in the sense that it comes from the same source. I guess this is where the bond sort of enters the scene: In the knowing that we came from the same source.

But the bond is in no way goal-oriented. It just exists on its own. It’s similar to my relationship with the movie She’s the Man. I really love this film. Loving it benefits me in no measurable way. It’s not like I even get to have conversations about the movie or my loving this movie with other people, because it is a terrible movie, and I have a reputation to maintain as a respectable young adult male. I’ve never had to write a report on this movie. I’ve never been paid to love it. I am not deriving powerful life-lessons every time I watch it—lessons that will make me a better person somewhere down the line. It provides me with nothing, really. I love it only because I do. I love it because it feels right to love it. There is no other motivation for my loving it. I just cannot help it. So loving my siblings is a lot like loving She’s the Man. I think that is pretty neat.

I always assumed the parent-child bond was the sacred apogee of all human relationship, and I’m still not convinced to the contrary, but I also think it is exclusive. I think the nature of that relationship is saved for Mom, Dad, and God. For loving any old bro—for loving the neighbor, so to speak—I try to aim more for the sibling relationship. Strangers are brothers and sisters more than they are moms and dads. It just translates easier this way for me. I have no personal reason to be so committed to them, but I must, because I feel compelled to. I hope this isn’t coming across as awful theology. That’s not at all what I’m going for, but to hell with it if it is.

I take pieces of being from my parents, but I am becoming adapted versions of my older brothers. At least that’s the hope. My brother Ryan especially has been an important paradigm of humanship for me, and he likely had no idea before my best man speech at his wedding. Now he only has a slight idea.

Ryan has always lived in the shadow of big brother Chris. At least that’s what he will tell you. And he never hesitates to tell you, begrudgingly, that this is unequivocally the case. He probably thinks if he says it enough, he will outshine the darkness of that shadow. And I must say, he’s actually been wildly successful with this approach.

Ryan was the bane of my existence growing up (which reminds me, he looks just like that guy in the body bag in the opening plane scene of The Dark Knight Rises.). He is also a huge reason for how I exist today. Ryan tormented me with the ferocity that any sibling ten years older should. That said, few people have been so committed to fostering my development and showering me with praise, or love, or chokeholds, or whatever it was I needed to be cleansed at the time.

For some inexplicable reason, and without even consciously realizing, I worshiped my brother in my younger years. It makes me sick to my stomach to admit that, but I am glad it is true. I did whatever Ryan did. This led me to sports, which would come to dominate most of my youthful existence. I was obsessed with anything that revolved around a ball. I still kind of am, I guess. It’s probably why I am so enamored by our solar system.

I think the art of sublimation through sports was critical for me. I hated attention as a kid, but sports stood as a means to express myself in way that was clean and justified—much more so than writing ever could be. Ryan would relentlessly run drills with me in the backyard, but he would also show up to my games. He was just always there, wherever I needed him to stand. This was not some twisted, elaborate scheme to relive his youth. He did these things for me; never did he do them for himself. I am always amazed by that. He toughened me up and often broke me down, but it was always just right.

When I was in middle school, Ryan had a rough little stretch, one that no twenty-something year-old should face. It did a lot to test his resiliency. His good friend from high school was killed by a drunk driver, and a short time after, his college roommate was taken by alcohol poisoning. This was right around the same time we all lost our grandma. For the first time, I saw my brother—whose brand of humor is enough to make a tree stump lose itself in a resonating laughter—just in a rotten place. He was confused, and it confused me. Whenever I talk about big parts of my life, this time with my brother—without fail—slips its way into the story. It is strange that it impacted me so much, but apparently it did.

It introduced the whole fragility of life thing. For the first time, that concept became very real. The knowledge that things come and die forced itself into my fragile conscience. I think another reason I always go back to that time is that it is when Ryan completely lost faith in God—when he started calling himself an atheist. It’s an ugly word: atheist. And I’m not saying they are ugly people. My brother is a beautiful person. It just has the taste of an ugly word.

Even as a middle-schooler, this whole atheist idea made me think, and it still does today. It represents a constant challenge to my own understanding of God, and my spirituality. How could someone who I know is so full of love and all that good stuff be doing what he does without any sort of attachment to God? How can he be loving completely on his own, without help from something greater? Does that mean I could do the same? It sure doesn’t seem like it, but I still don’t know. These are the questions generated from that time with my brother.

It took time for Ryan to swallow some of the challenges, but when he finally did, it turned out he had an enormous esophagus. He now lets these things drive him in leading a life that he knows some of his friends did not get a chance to. Through the turbulence, one thing was steady. Ryan never stopped giving of himself to me and to others. It is this that inspires me. I try to take it with me. He is my older brother. I go as he goes. So like Ryan, I went to college.

#personalnarrative