To my Partner in Crime on his Day of Birth

 Dear Joshua,

You are my brother. Your voice alone is pure comfort. One I know, trust, and understand. AM. FM. A childhood familiarity, a subtle, background hum of morning cereal and clicking seat belts. Your essence speaks my language. Whether that's the DNA pumping through our blood or maybe if we could graph the amount of time we spent together. X to the square root of 2, or something. Either way, your essence speaks my language, not only sympathizing but empathizing with unique fears,  instinctive circular thinking, impulsive whims, an unyeilding motivation to create. We laugh about baby whales and assisted "put the car in neutral and push" sneak outs. We cry about broken doors, and heaven only knows we understand about matching socks. It's a security thing. You knew that. You bought me the new ones. It was supposed to be the other way around, but you always took care of me. 

The family situation was raw; still a little sensitive. And it's like, your birthday, for heavens sake so i'll try to be brief on the topic of the century, but I want you to know, I need you to know, you're this really specific brand of very sticky glue. Not the Elmers with the orange lid or the gun with the million degree clear stick, but the one that comes in those dark little bottles from Home Depot. You know? With the animated gorilla and suddenly your fingers are literally stuck together. Anyway, so Autism had taken a hard hit and family was becoming sort of this cracked mirror or some other metaphorically shattered something or other. And you? A high school senior; student full time, working full time, cross country captain full time, high school sweetheart full time, church calling full time, associates degree full time, and somehow you were still there. You found time to be home and emanate this disposition of light and gratitude and through everything you managed to make us all laugh, when you were home we were always laughing. I remember you playing a lot of Nintendo 64 with him when he'd erupt, and sitting on my bedroom floor talking with me when I couldn't sleep and I don't know how else to tell you but that you were our glue. The gorilla kind, pulling together our pieces. 

I guess what i'm getting at here is thank you. Thank you for being there at the end of the line every time I needed you this year. Thank you for taking advantage of every "cool brother moment" growing up, for tossing your car keys to 15 year old Jackson and I, for frazils and four square and dominion and that sweet signed Steve Madden t. Thank you for taking the time to become best friends with the boy I love. Thank you for teaching me important things like; never wear a bright orange Gryffindor top to school pictures in the fourth grade (I often regret not heeding that wise advice), and the value of running with ears free to listen to your own breath and sound of your feet hitting the pavement. Thank you for teaching me (and everyone else) unconditional gratitude. Let me set up this scene. You are in the hospital with meningitis practically dying. And there you are thanking all the nurses and doctors for their help between puking your guts out. Who does that? I can just picture myself being wheeled between the halls screaming at everyone "I'M ALMOST DYING HERE." "COULD YA PUSH A LITTLE QUICKER!?" Anyway, i'm really glad you didn't die. 

Thank you for giving me my first big sister, you really couldn't have chose more perfectly, she's so, beautiful. Inside and out. This time in our lives is so fun, it's so crazy to watch our monopoly money turn into real money, our pretend cities turn into our apartments, our homes. Our pretend games are finally turning into real dreams and plans and futures. It's all so exciting, and I am so glad I get to be apart of it all. 

Thank you, for everything. This whole sibling big brother best friend thing is one of the happiest things in my world and I wouldn't trade you for anything (except a box of waffle crisp, those are so hard to find lately..) I'm so glad we have the knowledge of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ in our lives and that I get to have you as my big brother forever. 

I love you so much! Happy, Happy Birthday almost twin! 

--Fox.

(Hound?)

Whatever. 

First

                                                                March 19, 2014

First Post. Hurray! I think i'll celebrate with an outing downtown, the perfect excuse for a peanut butter cupcake from 25 Main. This semester has been nothing short of healthy; emotionally, physically, mentally. Balance has found it's way back into my life, and as always, with balance comes words. These words in particular came on a Tuesday afternoon at Barnes and Noble. Thank goodness for comfy couches, free words, and warm asiago pretzel's from Starbucks. Happy reading. Happy writing. Happy Wednesday. It's good to be here. 

I am a part of the earth. I belong here. Beneath a sky filled with pieces of light; a painted masterpiece, the finale of 12 hours, pink clouds tracing the endless blue. My hands touch the rough bark of a great oak. The earth’s spirit calls out, perfectly obedient to the will of its maker. So take a breath and allow the hollow tension of a few laps; sunshine will warm your cheeks and my soul, scattering freckles. A voice inside lifts an arm, all 1200 inches of my leg and all at once I am one, like the bark. I am controlled, free of cravings. I fill my body with fuel, my mind with truth. It takes well to the colors; yellow (banana), forest green (bell pepper), brown (whole grain).

I am aerobics and weight training and jazz and triathlon. More than anything though, I am seeking breath. Please fill my body with air. No, I will not be perfect. I can’t. My friends are not perfect, “WE DON’T WANT TO BE.” Excuse me, “We don’t want to be.” We don’t want your billboards and magazine covers, in fact, we painted all of them. Does that bother you? Because I am not sorry. We painted them with the gap in her teeth she has talked through for eighteen years and the way his eyes smile with him, like his entire face and spirit and toes are smiling and suddenly everybody else was, too. We painted them in passports and bled them with airplane tickets. Long Beach, California and Asunción, Paraguay and Atlanta, Georgia and (endless) pails of pure, blinding white. We painted your bill boards with so much light and truth they actually crumbled beneath our gentle weight.

Can I go back and tell the seventh grader? Would she have listened? She was lost in your magazines.

There were times I swayed. I hold my head high and say this though because my story is simple. Something inside called me back; stabilizing, grounding, purpose, direction. That direction is up, by the way, past your fallen billboards. Towards a man who watches. Who teaches through little hands with smudges of peanut butter, through bruised knees and meningitis and cut hair. He teaches to stand.  And I am so, strong.

I still have twelve hours, at least, until he paints the sky with colors preparing for tomorrow. I’ll try again.