My only brother recently urged me to die and go to hell.
An hour later, my wife and I were laughing hysterically. Which, I must say, made us feel a whole lot better. And reminded me of an excellent essay I read not long ago in the Los Angeles Times.
Entitled “My brother’s last joke changed the way I understand grief,” it tells the story of a man on his deathbed with pancreatic cancer whose brother—the essay’s author—came to bid him farewell with several other siblings still on their way.
As the delayed mourners’ car pulled into the driveway, John Kenney writes, the dying brother quickly “dropped his arm off the side of the chair. Let his head fall to one side. And trying to suppress a grin, he said, ‘Tell them they’re too late.’ I laughed. Out loud. Mouth open, shocked, laughing. It was gorgeous. A feeling so life-affirming in a moment of such pain and fear. It would be the last time I ever saw him alive.
“Is it possible,” Kenney concludes, “that laughter isn’t the opposite of grief, but maybe its most honest expression?”
Grief, of course, doesn’t always involve death of the immediate physical kind. In fact, that recent hateful encounter with my own brother, which also could well be our last conversation, evokes a grief equally deep but of a different hue.
I should probably pause here to explain our relationship. In truth, it’s been one of love/hate—at least on his part—ever since we were kids. In recent years, however, it’s evolved into more of an on-again-off-again connection with the breaker switch in his hands. He last pulled it just under two years ago after reading one of my columns expressing political sentiments of which he disapproved.
“You’ve brought nothing but negativity into my whole life!” he ranted, or words to that effect; an allegation he repeated more recently while willing my descent into hell.
That occurred, of all places, in Caridad, Philippines, the tiny Siargao Island village where my dear wife was born. It’s also the birthplace of my brother’s spouse, who happens to be my wife’s first cousin. Ewe, I hear you thinking, that must be awkward; and of course, you’re exceedingly right.
Anyway, in Caridad for one of our occasional weekend visits, we had no idea that my brother was visiting from the US because, well, he hadn’t bothered to tell us. Which isn’t too surprising, I suppose, given that he and I hadn’t communicated since he pulled that breaker switch early last year.
But then, on the morning of our departure, someone said they’d seen him walking laboriously down the road. “He moves like an auto-bot,” declared our informant, doing an ape-like imitation. “He doesn’t look too good.”
And so, we faced a difficult decision: to be or not to be. More specifically, as the great Shakespeare put it:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them.
My brother was not happy to see us. Which is how the conversation quickly devolved into the death wish previously mentioned. To be fair, both of us managed to expel some pretty nasty stuff. Honestly, though, if it were a contest, I’d have to give him the gold.
So where do we presently stand? By the time you read this, my brother will likely be back home in Southern California. And as I’ve said, given that we’re both in our seventies, it’s very possible—perhaps even probable—that this was our last conversation.
Despite his earnest wish for my early demise, however, it’s anyone’s guess which one of us will go first. So newly inspired by John Kenney’s wonderful essay on humor, let me just say this: if it’s him and, by some miracle, I’m asked to speak at his funeral, I’ll try my best to make the mourners laugh.
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David Haldane is an award-winning American author, journalist, and radio broadcaster with homes in Southern California and Northern Mindanao., Philippines. This column—which appears weekly in The Manila Times—has been compiled in two books: A Tooth in My Popsicle and Dark Skies: Tales of Turbulence in Paradise.
