Today, my brother Dan would have been 49 years old. Whenever I see the date July 14th, I cannot help but think of him. As you may know from my blog entry about my childhood memories with Dan, the loss of my closest brother & best friend remains a hole in my heart that will never be filled. We learn to live with the holes our loved ones create when we lose them, but that doesn’t make it any easier. People always say that time heals all wounds, but does it? Really? This past weekend, I mustered up the courage to watch a home video (originally recorded on VHS but transferred to DVD by my brother Dave, bio-granddad of my son Daniel, named for the brother I lost) that captured my family during my father’s 65th birthday–in November of 1998. Little did we know that he would pass in May 1999. My brother Dan would follow, also losing his battle with cancer in March 2004. So, in less than 5 years, our family lost both my father & brother. This home video recording captured storytelling at my dad’s birthday party, meaning that I would be able to hear both my father’s & brother’s voices.

My father was big on home movies. We had this old projector that would occasionally come out (think Clark Griswold in Christmas Vacation watching old movies up in the attic) with reels & reels of priceless footage. Along with a Kodac slide machine projector & slides, that 8 mm film projector brought images of the past to life.

There was a certain magic in being able to see my parents & siblings so young, captured forever in these movements & gestures that revealed different people from the ones I knew at that present time. My mom would laugh & act playfully, & little signs of familial bonds were communicated in exchanged smiles, little touches, & a general closeness. Even those movies & slides lacked sound, the purr of the projector gave a whispered hush that felt soothing for this introverted child. I could imagine the conversations between people who died long before I was born–my maternal grandparents. Later, my brother Dave, practically our family archivist, set still pictures & home VHS films to music on videos, immortalizing a number of special moments we all shared as a family. Christmases, family BBQs, weddings, christenings, kids’ birthday parties, game nights, & road trips. As a family, we had a visual record of events we could revisit. And that could create moments of cognitive dissonance for me, as time & my memory could distort the way I remembered things. When I watched the recordings, I had to face the actual images & events in their literal, 2-dimensional sense.

The biggest trigger for cognitive dissonance for me sprang from hearing the voices of my father & brother in the past.

For some reason, Dan’s voice surprised me more than the voice of my father. I don’t know if I had blocked out how he sounded from my memory, or if my mind just tried to erase & replace with a variety of voices of my brother through the years. I could remember Danny’s voice from when we were kids in youth, but this adult voice was different. The voice had a different timbre, resonated in a foreign way. My siblings, one by one, took turns roasting my dad–our family always had a thing for telling stories with humor. At that birthday party, Dad was in remission, so this celebration was one of his life. We didn’t know the cancer would return only 3 months later with a vengeance, claiming him shortly afterwards. By some miracle, we were able to capture these stories & our family, our whole family undamaged & untraumatized. A family reminiscent from that of my childhood & adolescence, like the one I remembered from huge holidays & Sunday dinners. Laughing, drinking, dancing. Welling up with tears & hugging in sentimental moments. The whole gamut.

Remembering my brother, like remembering my father, causes me to grieve for more than just the loss of them as people & family members. Their passing triggered a domino effect of so many other losses: The selling of the family home. The cessation of those big family events. Family members no longer bonded by love but jockeying to love or care the most about whom we lost. The fracturing of our big family unit into a million pieces. The silent treatments. The arguments over stupid, stupid things.

Learning to live with loss is now the new normal as we continue to face this pandemic. I’ve lost an aunt to COVID-19, but I know there will be more losses to come. I share my mourning of Dan on his birthday not to be morose or overly sentimental, but rather because my heart goes out to all those families who are now facing similar losses, similar fractures to their family. There’s a loss of innocence when children experience the death of a parent or a sibling loses another sibling, no matter the age of those children-turned-adults. Introverts like me tend to reflect & analyze our thoughts, including those of the past. Home confinement & self-quarantining provide plenty of time for such pondering & processing. There’s an emotional weight we are all bearing now each day we see those tallies go up for populations of infected & those who continue to die. As an INFJ & highly sensitive person, I can’t just block it all out. Remembering Dan on this birthday, in the midst of a global pandemic, hits me in a different way. His medical struggles & the trauma of watching it resurfaces, along with the pain of my father’s own struggle. My heart goes out to so many families, the loved ones of so many now lost, who face their own medical struggles & traumas.

So, please, dear reader–let the ones you love know you love them. Yes, I’m corny or trite in referring to a James Taylor song, but do “shower the people you love with love.” You never know when you will lose them, & the current state of the world actually requires such communication of care. You just never know. Take it from one who knows now.