Landed on Mercury
My cousin Alan once told us a joke. A duck walks into a bar and asks “Got any grapes?” Bartender says “What? Grapes? No, this is a bar, not a fruit store. Get out, duck” Next day the duck comes back, “Got any grapes?” Bartender says “Dammit duck, I told you to get out. Quit coming here asking for grapes or I’m going to nail your beak to the wall. Next day the duck comes back, “Got a hammer?” Bartender is furious, “What’s with you duck? Does this look like a hardware store? It’s a bar! I don’t have any hammers here!” Duck grins, “Good. Got any grapes?”
The joke (the duck and the clerk) was something that my brother and I used to bring up once a year and find a way to use that to describe how simple jokes and stories can change your entire perspective on current events and things in life. We would draw from old tales like the Odyssey or new tales like Breaking Bad are all the same story. Stories are like energy, constantly being shifted and changing every day.
A lot has changed over the past 90 days of my life. I spend a lot of my time thinking about writing blogs and trying to make things perfect, getting in my own way and not publishing blog posts or projects. I lost my job due to COVID-19, My grandpa who lived to be about 90 years old, and my twin brother. The shock of it all should affect most people in ways that may lead them to drinking, long bouts of depression, or possible suicide. I haven’t felt any of that. Sitting on your hand until it goes numb is the best way to describe how I feel.
My brother had spent the last 10 years fighting with diabetes and trying to change dietary habits to adjust well. Over the last 10 years our bond stayed close. The struggles of constantly moving from Florida to New York and trying to find steady income while pursuing his passion had its ups and downs. The ups would be the moments of clarity when he knew he was at the right place at the right time and would grab opportunity by the horns. The lows, however, were like starting up at rock bottom and trying to find a ladder. His depression lead to alcoholic binges which he explained helped numb his body and allow his blood sugar levels to “pause” for a second before they spiked.
He was never one to have someone pity him and hated when people worried about his body or if he was okay mentally, so he spent a lot of time watching movies and locking into films to escape his own world even if it were for a few hours. That is what music and composition did for him as well. During the stressful moments where he would ask whether he should pay for food and gas or pay his phone bill he would lock into music and write lyrics, come up with screen plays, draft freestyles or mix and master music tracks. His passion, like mine, was a way in which he could avoid the screaming in his head and the spread of scenarios in his mind while trying to figure anything out.
Over the last year he had finally found his niche in the music and entertainment industry. I was so proud that I was able to help walk him through going to see a therapist, finding out ways to get the city of New York to try and pay for metformin or diabetic glucose monitors. I spoke to him 5 years prior about taking the best out of bad situations and finding ways to get him to and from home so that he can keep his sanity and get out of his home to see the world. We were able to explore areas in the United States and Jamaica before he left and those memories I will keep with me forever.
His thoughts on death were different from our christian views that our upbringing had exposed us to. Although our ideas were different and our lives may have shifted down different roads he had always told me that if he died he didn’t want people to cry, mourn, or spend time trying to find out why. His thoughts on the life that people live and the simulacra that we are all in are a spec in the history of the world. What he didn’t know is that his grain of sand is what moved waves around him and our family.
Our last few conversations were about writing a novel to use as the source for a screen play. Knowing that thinking about a budget would produce levels of stress that we didn’t see the need to include in our workload was a consistent thing we agreed on. Our goals were to finish the book, publish the book, then focus on animation and using open source software to create an animated film for the book so that we wouldn’t have to deal with the complication of casting and scheduling conflicts. He wanted to find methods that would capture our own struggles and explore them in different scenarios to see if people would try to figure out which part is creativity and which parts were pulled from our real lives. I plan on taking our passionate conversations and press them into something digestible for the world.
I have taken my passion for computers and code, since the age of 9, and made it a means of living. My new passion, is making sure that our ideas will go from idea to concepts to completion. Passion is what drives us. Passion will be the way we go out. Although many others didn’t know all the ins and outs of his life, which I admit I wasn’t by his side every day and will not admit nor accept that I knew him front to back like a book, I was the person he spoke to about his fears. His triggers that would cause him to go into days of depression. Watching his struggles that he and diabetes fought daily that exhausted him, the issues with his kidneys, his teeth, vision, and endurance levels hardened me for his departure. Knowing that he doesn’t have to fight anymore brings me a sense of peace.
Call it twin telepathy (if you believe that) but I used to get this feeling in the pit of my stomach if I hadn’t talked to him or heard from him in more than 48 hours or more, I would call him. He would mention he was on the hospital for various reasons or locked in on a project or we would pick back up on shows and film we watched and reviewed. After hearing from him that feeling would go from a weird pain/discomfort to a numbness. Almost as if it were a sign of some sort. That painful feeling sits with me every day since the doctor called. Its as if something is missing inside of me. Its been a little over a month and I know I hide the pain I’m feeling but I miss him so much. I know he would hate that every day I wake up and trying to take things day by day but my fiance catches me at nights in mid conversation break down and start crying. Trying to plan a wedding with one missing chair, one missing plate, one missing plane ticket really hurts. Thinking about how excited he would be to see my new office or new things I’m doing in life but knowing he won’t, makes it difficult to sit in my office at times. Getting calls from family that would never call me or chat with me on a day to day basis try to reach out and share the same “I’m at a loss for words” script is hard to accept. Rambling in a blog post that may show up online that family may end up reading one day feels like something that might help, but who really knows.
Every day I try to focus on living to be a better and healthier person so that I can live as long as possible because I feel that it would be exactly what he would want but I can’t text him to find out. I can only recall the phone calls of us crying our thoughts and feelings out, the silence on the phone that speaks for us. The hardest part is trying to find a new normal. This numb feeling hasn’t gone away. I thought it would when I prepared his death certificate. I thought it would when I confirmed payment for his cremation with my dad. I thought it would when I got his ashes and shared it in small cremation necklaces, but it hasn’t.
Internet articles, friends, blogs, and anywhere you look will tell you to seek a therapist, look into losing weight more, focus on creating a routine, talking to someone, cry it out because its okay to cry,feel your feelings, but none of that feels as good as writing this right now. The 11pm phone calls that lasted 3 hours wont happen anymore. Saturday’s at 12:30am are times when I reflect on my week and what direction I should take the next day. Maybe its because I’m hoping a doctor will call me back and tell me they made a mistake and that my brother has been in a coma for the past month and has just woken up.
Maybe its because every person I look at that knew my brother or interacted with him looks at me with sorrow. Maybe its because if this was a movie idea of ours he would be an angel that talks to me that no one else could see and would talk to me like detective stabler on an old episode of Law and Order SVU. I will never know. What I do know is that his ticket has been punched and he has officially landed on Mercury. Maybe one day ill be able to take a trip, meet him on Mercury, and ask him if he has any grapes. Rest in Peace and travel safely.