Naked Updates

Unfortunately my brother was killed in a car wreck this week. We’re not sure of details but know that his choices had turned dark in the last few months. Life can be hard on everyone, some souls are better equipped to do this battle and some are not. Everyone deserves to know joy and light and that is something my brother was seeking.
Love and light forever to guide his spirit in this world.

From my book written several years ago:

My brother is an addict. He is now clean and sober, but always an addict. I'll be honest, I don't really know his story. I don't know when he started using, I don't know why. As I type this I realize I have never asked. I know he went to rehab in high school and that was when he lived in South Carolina and I was still living in Tennessee. I wasn't there when they took him to the hospital and dropped him off, I wasn't there when they had family counseling or family visit day. I never spoke to him one time. I really saw this as “not my problem.” I thought he was a pain in the ass. There was so much drama. It reminded me of all the drama with my mom and her abusive alcoholic relationship. I wasn't close to him or my sister and I was not involved in their day-to-day lives. I was living a life of one, by myself, with no close attachments. Self-preservation was my goal. I just wanted to be normal and have a normal life. I realize now that I was too caught up in trying to “make it” somewhere. I was trying to get to that proverbial high ground where things like drug addictions cannot reach you or your family. Like many people, I think unconsciously I thought addicts were selfish and just weren't strong enough to pull it together. My brother, well, he is the most caring one of all of us. He is the one that always brings my mom a card and a rose on Valentine's Day. My mom loves him differently than she loves my sister and I. She doesn't love him more, just differently. As a mother now of a son, I can empathize with her. I realize that where we see a grown man, she still sees her ten year old little boy. I know other mothers that struggle with this now. I see them cry. They are in so much pain at the torment their children are in. They feel somehow that they contributed to the problem and they feel helpless that they cannot fix it or make it go away. The addict is a tortured soul, afraid of reality and unable to pull out of the cycle by themselves, yet they must do it alone and for themselves only, when they are ready. The last time my brother was in rehab it stuck. He decided he wanted to live. To my knowledge he's never had a relapse since then. I have watched him work extremely hard to build a real life for himself. He is a cook. He has been in the same job for longer than most people. He never misses work. I watched him get a small apartment that was close to a bus stop so he could ride to work. I have never ridden a bus to work. I watched him work two jobs just to buy food. I have never worked two jobs. I struggled to lose weight always wanting to cheat just a little, he could never cheat just a little and have one little sip of alcohol. He did whatever it took to live a real life. I was still living a fake one, and I knew that people didn't look at us that way. On the outside, I had a life and he didn't. They were wrong. He learned what life was. He learned to appreciate everything, every little thing, regardless of its cost. His favorite cost for things is free. Joe is a junker. He loves to pick things up off the side of the road. He started this way before recycling and repurposing were cool. He started before there was American Pickers or any other glamorized television show about junkers. If you have something that you want gone from your house, anything, he will take it. He always knows someone or can find someone who needs it. He is always swapping things, selling things, and ironically, fixing things. I have given him more junk that he has fixed or sold than I can imagine. I like it. I love it, actually. He called me last night and told me about the lawnmower that I gave him a while back. It didn't work when I gave it to him, but a guy finally found a small part that he thought he needed and it finally started today. He was so proud to say, “I have a brand new lawnmower.” I was amazed. It was a piece of junk in my shed that I just wanted to get rid of. He has a lawnmower. My brother and I went to the hospital not long ago with my mom as she was having a complete knee replacement performed. He and I were together in the waiting room for several hours. I was going ape-wild and was incredibly uncomfortable as this OR waiting room was full of families that thrived on the hospital experience. You know the ones, they have 14 people that show up because Aunt Bethel is going to have her procedure done today. This is a social opportunity for all family members to catch up on every single detail of everyone's life for the past 10 years. I swear to you, it is a family reunion! They have people calling the pay phone all day long checking on Bethel, 4 preachers come by to check on the entire family and did I mention they have several babies with them that the grandparents are watching and there are 4 people with the same name, all called Granny? They are everywhere in the waiting room. I secretly think they are there for the cheap cafeteria food. So we're stuck, Joe and I, together, for what would be about 6 hours. He has taken the day off from work, so he is relaxed and thankful to not be working. I never officially take a day off, but I can't get much done from a no cell zone in the hospital, and I am learning to be uncomfortable, and I am! What am I going to do here all day? Ok universe, why am I here today? Who am I supposed to talk to do? So I started talking to Joe. I leaned into being uncomfortable and tried to seek to understand someone else. I was tired of thinking about myself and where I was and where I was going and what I needed to do all the time. I just started asking him questions and we had a conversation, probably the first one I ever had with him. I actually listened with interest to what he said. I learned a lot about him and even more about me. I started with a very naked question, “Why do you want to pick all that trash up from the side of the road?” Where I live, there is always something on the side of the road on trash day. People are constantly putting out the stuff they no longer want or need. Joe likes to think of himself as a treasure hunter. He doesn't see anything as trash. He sees a few extra dollars, a new toy, something broken that just needs a little TLC to be running again. He told me about some lanterns that he found that were antiques that he sold for fifty bucks. He told me about a huge aquarium that he found that he cleaned up and set up in his house. He told me about the things that he swapped out for pieces and parts of things he actually needed. This was all really fun for him. His eyes lit up, he was excited talking about the things he can do with something that costs nothing. It warmed my heart to see him so excited. I thought people only got this excited when they talked about what they did for a living, their new cars, or the vacations they were planning. I laughed so hard with him. He was telling me stories that I had never heard before and was so open about who he was and how he felt about trash and picking it up from people's yards. He gave me a safe place to be naked by being naked himself. I confessed that I didn't think I had the courage to ever stop my car at someone's curb and pick up something they left for trash, I didn't care what it was. What if they saw me getting it? I can hear his voice right now saying, “Well, I just smile and wave at them. Thank them.” Well, that thought never crossed my mind. You see, I was realizing that the world was much bigger and different than I thought. All of a sudden it hit me; Joe was like a thrown away toy. There were many people that left him on the side of the road when he was using. Most people thought he would never change, never get clean, hold a job, or be a real part of our family. I was one of those people. I didn't think there was anything I could do for him and he didn't care enough about me to do anything for himself. I am ashamed of that time I spent in hiding. Hiding from the “dirtiness” of having an addict for a brother. It just didn't fit into the life I had imagined, so I ignored it completely and Joe, I am extremely sorry. I wanted to be the family in the magazine, great house, good looking, fantastic vacations, you know the picture in THE magazines! When things happened that didn't fit in with the magazine image, I got mad. Who did I get mad at? Well, the same person we all get mad at, everyone and no one in particular. We just fester about how other people (no defined others of course) screw up our lives. Your life is screwed up because your spouse didn't get the yard cut before the Easter lunch you wanted to prepare for your extended family, your plates don't all match and good grief, none of those things are really important. I could have learned a lot from Joe. I could have learned humility, grace and gratitude. I could have learned courage and fearlessness, but I thought I knew more than him. I could have learned what joy was and happiness as well. Perhaps I thought I was a little better than him, having a college degree and all. I was wrong. He is a more courageous person than I will ever be. I'm sorry, but you can't make others get naked. You can't love addicts clean, you can't make your spouse tell you the truth, and you can't make your girlfriend see that she is overweight because she eats junk all the time! People will only get naked on their timeline, in their safe place. What can you do? You can be naked yourself. By allowing others to see our naked selves (as my brother did for me) it allows them to reveal a little bit of their true self. Once you get a small taste of acceptance when you're quite certain you're going to be ostracized or outcast, you build some momentum. You realize that maybe, just maybe, you can tell people the truth, let them know who you are.