"We'd been graced"

My brother, Rick, and my son, Adam, celebrating their birthdays (May 28 and 29) together in 1983.

Today is my brother's birthday.  

He was the oldest of my siblings and just 13 months older than I. 

 I knew him longer than I have known anyone in my life.  

Last week my sister shared this article from the New York Times Sunday Review,  

in which Frank Bruni writes about the bond of siblings.  

These are the words that resonated with me the most: 

It’s as if we signed some contract long ago, 
before we were even aware of what we were getting into, 
and over time gained the wisdom to see that we hadn’t been duped. 

We’d been graced: 

with a center of gravity; with an audience that never 

averts its gaze and doesn’t stint on applause.

Today I think back on over 60 years of memories.
I think of how much I wish we were sitting on that porch tonight,
celebrating together.  I think of how "we'd been graced."

We miss you, big brother, more than words can say.
Happy Birthday.

To learn more about Rick, go here.
To read an earlier post on the bond I share 
with my siblings go here.

"It is all the same clay"

Today I happened across "A Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor", a website with a daily post of a poem, some literary history, and possibly other goodies for lovers of writing.  I subscribed to the newsletter and the daily feed to Google Reader.  When I read today's post I discovered that it's Anna Quindlen's birthday.
I've read most of Anna Quindlen's novels, many of her columns, and some of her non-fiction.   But of all of her books, the one that has meant the most to me is "Siblings", a book about sibling relationships with photos by Nick Kelsh.   I first read an excerpt from the book in a magazine about 1998 and clipped it out, filing it away as I do many clippings.  I ran across that clipping years later and decided to see if the book it was lifted from was still available.  Thanks to the wonders of online booksellers,  I was able to order four used copies (it's no longer in print) - one for myself and one for each of my siblings.  I sent the books to my siblings at Thanksgiving in 2006 with a letter in which I wrote:  "She writes that she 'doesn't understand how people learn to live in the world if they haven't had siblings.'  She says that 'we can never really lose them, or we have lost our history, our past, a part of ourselves that we cannot do without.'"  I underlined that last phrase and put it in bold type and wrote "I cannot do without the three of you."  Quindlen doesn't sugarcoat the sibling relationship.  She recognizes the tensions, the jealousies, all of the negative emotions.
About that same time I sent my children a copy of the excerpt from the book.  I reminded them that as young adults with busy lives and small children it is surely hard to make time to stay in close contact with each other - but that one day those children would be on their own.  That if they didn't make the time for each other now they may realize one day that they don't know each other very well anymore.  And that would be a great, great, loss, for they will need each other.
I realize that I am incredibly blessed by the love and support of my siblings.  We haven't grown apart over the years, though we have certainly lived great distances apart.  It  has not all been smooth going.  There have been misunderstandings and resentments, as there are in all relationships.  But the love is always there, holding us together.  I love you Ricky, Ann, and Mary!

"'Flesh of my flesh,' they may sometimes say in the marriage ceremony, but it's just not true.  It is not even true of our children who are part of us; part of someone dear to us; loved by us; but not made of what we are made of.  But our brothers and sisters:  Well, it is all the same clay."  Anna Quindlen