My Other Brother

My other brother, the other brother of c.s.ellington. He’s fabulous. I have the best brothers, 5 in all. Today, I am writing about my other brother. The one in the mosaic image pictured here. I will tell you I met him at midlife. I met him on Facebook, after learning of him a dozen years before that. And after all those years, I was ready to move forward. I moved forward, personally, in many ways.

One spring, two years ago, I sat at my computer for an extended time. I was suffering from allergies for the first time in my life. I was taking some time out, allowing my body to know what it needed to do to recover. And I started exploring. And I started thinking, I started seeing the possibility of contacting brothers I had only known about in pictures.

I sat with courage. Why I needed courage, I cannot fully say. I needed some. I had some. I moved forward. It is a funny story and one I may tell, in time, but for now I will move to the moment I contacted my second brother, the first that wrote back to me. I found him on Facebook. I found a picture of him with a white sheet over his head. I find that some of my brothers, like I do, speak in code. There are meanings underneath the layers. Hidden in the verses are words within spirit.

I introduced myself. I took a nap. I woke up from my nap. I had a message back from my brother. He was in England. He wrote back to me. He was light. He wrote, “What’s up, sistah, nice to meet you!” I smile at this, even now, it’s my language. This is my friendliest brother, the one that looks in on my life most. May every person who wishes for a brother have 5 brothers, with wonderful qualities as each of mine do.

“It takes two men to make one brother.” – Israel Zangwill

There is something about this. I sit in my big white bed and watch the traffic outside my apartment window. It is a beautiful spring day, much like the spring day I reached out to contact new brothers and almost exactly to the date of two years ago. Maybe it was this day! I celebrate the thought of having the courage to reach out, to know and be known and in the knowing to find myself more fully. To know of lives I have been separated from for what felt like a lifetime. The good news is that, at midlife, there is another lifetime ahead of me still. I look forward to the possibility of it.

This one is stronger, this one is more complete. I have learned so much about myself in the last two years. I smile at the thought of this and my eyes look with love upon each of my brothers. And my eyes look with love upon one of my fathers I did not know in this life .. though in this second life, it has come to be that he travels in thought more fully with me. He left behind a gift, a part of himself, that I can see. And I thank God for my brothers, who have put themselves in front of me to share a life I would not have otherwise known.

If anyone in your life is absent, I encourage you to reach out to that person and, if that person is not available to reach out to, those that person loved and was loved by. The circle grows more complete with every hand that is held in this way. I see peace in this. I highly recommend it!

c.s.ellington