For My Brother

There are somethings that are harder to write than others. For some there is no end to the words that can be used to describe it. And there are some that are all feelings and colours that come together to make up a vague portrait. I’ll do my best to make sense because this one of those hard times. 

There is a strange relief that comes when “the thing” finally happens. When the change you saw coming a mile away finally comes. Because really you saw it coming from across the ocean and it took its sweet time arriving.

My brother left for school a country away. It’s not the first time and it probably won’t be the last, somehow it never really gets any easier. He leaves and then I leave it’s our pattern. Maybe it’s because he’s just a little bit older and maybe it’s because we’re just a little bit the same.

It wasn’t the moment we hugged goodbye that got me, it wasn’t the moment he got in the car, it wasn’t even the moment I waved, it was the finality that gripped me as I watch him drive out onto the road. Because it really was the end of something great. I would never choose to do it again, and that’s a hard truth, but I would never wish it away. Because I wouldn’t have come half as far, if it wasn’t for the time we had together. 

But now the time has come to go our separate ways and make a path in this world. And I have no doubt that our time isn’t really over, we are family after all. It’s just the closing of this book, we had out healing and we had more redemption than I ever thought possible and now we get to write the new story. The one where I come visit and the one where you send postcards. It’s, it’s gonna be great. 

I didn’t really set out to write you a letter today but here I am. Sitting on the couch and dreaming of the very real days we get to live in now. And it’s not perfect, because maybe there just a little too much distance, but it is realer then I thought it would be. And it’s quite a bit brighter than I ever would have thought possible. Thank you, for being my brother even when it felt impossible, and for walking through the storm with me.