Monday, August 29, 2016

BIRTHDAY FOR A BROTHER



  My older younger brother just had a milestone birthday.  
(I am the oldest of three brothers; he's the second one, so doesn't that make him my 'older younger brother' ?) At any rate, this week he had THE birthday . . . 75 . . .  that some gerontologists say is the demarcation line separating us from the 'young old' . . . which is the category in which our 'baby brother' at 67 currently resides.  Neither of the three of us can quite fathom how we arrived here so quickly.

   I have a clear memory of riding with our parents and Uncle Frank Durham on the day he came home  from his birthing hospital.  However, I remember only through  hearing repetitive parental narrative how, in time, I allegedly inquired as to when they were  'going to take that kid back to the hospital?'

They decided to keep him





Even though our growing up years were "a while back", there are lots of memories that provide retelling of old stories whenever we are together.  

In high school, Den excelled in athletics.  At UNC Chapel Hill, he was pre-med and after Internship, did his Residency in Orthopedics  at Yale-New Haven Hospital.  There is a kind of stereotyping of medical specialist according to personality and temperament.  Whether correct or not, Orthopedics is the domain of athletic types and Den fit the profile, being the physically strongest and most athletic of the brothers.

UNC undergrad


After spending time practicing 'Army medicine', including a year at Saigon General Hospital,  Den spent his entire medical career in New Hampshire.  He arrived there by the circuitous route brought on by needing a job after his college Freshman year.  I asked the owner of the boys' camp where I had spent a couple of Summers if he would hire my brother.  While there, he met Irena, a Syracuse University undergrad, whose family owned a nearby summer cottage.  And, as the saying goes, "the rest is history".  They raised three remarkable and accomplished children and are now the doting grand-parents of six --- three boys and three girls. He retired a couple or so years ago and spends time traveling, catching up on missed golf games and enjoying their place on Lake Winnepesaukee.

1965

Newly weds with younger version of older brother in background


50 years later 

Soon to be Major with wife and oldest child, ca. 1970

One story that is often retold is how he scared the bejeebers out of a camper who had been exiled to the lakeside while the other kidders were preparing for bed.  My brother put on his sunglasses, trench coat and army helmet liner and was sneaking up on the young hellion.  The kid saw Den at the same time that a loon cut loose with a cry.  I was 500 yards away in center camp and I heard the scream.  The Head Counselor ... 50  + years to my 22 ... outran me down the beach to the scene.  

While our parents paid for the two of us to have piano lessons, neither of us has musical talent. For that matter, neither of us can carry a tune in the proverbial bucket, that talent having gone to the youngest brother.   Several years ago,  he attended a Bluegrass concert and at intermission asked the band leader if they would sing Life's Railway to Heaven, an old Gospel song.  The man replied, "We don't sing no spirichul songs."  Subsequently, I made a recording for him that included every version that I could locate.

Now we get together primarily at family Thanksgiving gatherings.  He lives too far away.  He dislikes North Carolina's Summer Swelterings and has acclimated to New Hampshire Winters.  
When he and his family are here this coming Thanksgiving, no doubt some of the same old stories will be told again (to use dad's long ago phrase) for the 'fortyleventhbluemillionth time'.  But then, old stories are a kind of mortar that help bond folks together.
"The Way We Were" . . .   3 brothers ca. 1962


"The Way We Are" ... Thanksgiving 2015


So, "Happy 75",  'Little Brother' and 'Welcome' to this phase of the journey.

                                  Satchel




1 comment:

  1. Brings back several memories.
    Real live Uncle Sam

    ReplyDelete