“I think everyone who commented here understands. There is no cloud in the sky in which to sit forever. And there is no fire below us in which to burn forever. Life is far too intriguing and complicated for the afterlife to be so simple. We are our own gods, our own devils, we are ourselves. We are alone and connected, all at the same time.”
A year without your smile. A year without your laugh. A year without your warmth. A year without your love. A year without my brother. A year without my friend.
A year.
I cant even think about it; how much I miss you. What I wouldn’t give just to have one last conversation with you, just to hear the sound of your voice. I just want to hear you laugh again, and I want you to know that I love you. You made a horrible mistake and it cost you your life. I can’t even begin to describe my anger and frustration, but above all that is a numbing emptiness. I feel like a shell, a husk. I’m empty. Lost in a crowd of strangers.
Maybe I wasn’t always there for you. Maybe I tried to push you away because we believed in different things. Maybe I wasn’t a good big brother. But I always loved you. You were always the person I wanted to see at the end of the day. You were my little brother. You were my best friend.
What I wouldn’t give to switch places with you. You had so much going for you. You had so much potential. And it is gone. You had so much more to give. Not a day goes by that I wish it was me, that you are still here.
It’s been a rough year without you.
I just hope that where ever you are, you are happy and you are loved.
Evan
My Lovebird likes the warmth of my laptop… and she loves her nightly head scratch
A guise of moral ambiguities wrapped up to mean so much more or simply a laughing hand with which to prattle? A broken face mangled in rage and hate or one simply ragged by sadness each step of a day? The beating clock of time slowly ticking away waiting endlessly or the ticking of a beating heart so on edge and filled with doubt that it no longer breaths? A smiling face the fastest route between people or the open embrace of a loved one a closer step to a kindred heart?
So you’re not perfect. So your imperfections are laughably human. But its all you ever had. All you ever will have. All you ever should wish to have. That’s you. Here, now. A tiny piece of flesh and bone on a mote of dust perched precariously on the verge of oblivion. A cosmic rarity. Boy, it’s been a long time running hasn’t it? Only you can decide if its well worth the wait, isn’t that true? Because, after all, aren’t you the one who decided to stick around, given your faults and the condition of your human folly? You decided that even in your gaining and realization at the concept of nothingness, you found everything. You stayed. You’re here. You’re with us. Your human condition didn’t preclude you to any imagined self importance or dwell fretfully so on your own mortal condition. You embraced it. You loved it. You owned it. It was you, not you it.
Seen empires fall, seen great men born, evil men rise, and hope soar. You’ve seen the horrors that we humans can deal to each other, as well as the love that we are capable of for one an other. Even though we are hampered by repeating the same mistakes, we still trudge on in our loneliness, knowing full-well that on our spec of dust in the vastness, we are alone. No one is coming to save us from ourselves. For a small, insignificant species such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love.
You deserve it. After all, being human isn’t easy. The strain of life is itself the most taxing adventure anyone has ever journeyed on. One that has no maps, no destination, not even a start. Yet you never gave up. You went on even when mounting turmoils and seemingly impossibilities surrounded you. Human and stubborn you went on. And for that I love you. I can only wish you the best and hope that where ever you may be, that where ever your journey takes you, I hope you’re happy, and I hope you’re loved.
If you are human. If you feel. If you dream. You need to watch this.
Maybe it wasn’t about you. Maybe it was never just about you. But I’ll never know. We don’t say. Even for all the anger I hold in, I still love you, always and ever. I miss you.
and in the longing I feel in my heart, in the rage I feel in your absence, I still believe that being a big brother was better than being a super hero.
No matter how much we fought of some silly misgivings, you were always there with me. And now you’ve left me alone in this mess. I never got to tel you much I really loved you. How everything I ever did in my life was because of you. Mostly out of jealousy, to try and show mom and dad that I was worth a damn too. But mostly I did things with you, not to best you, but because you were my friend.
I thought being a big brother made me a superhero. Maybe for a time I was in your eyes. But now I realize how weak I was. Am.
We were wanderers from the beginning.
Left to discover, explore, and reason with ourselves about our surroundings. I always looked at things through a veil of ice. More calculated, cold, sterile, and took things far more literal. You. You looked at things in a joyous light. You saw life and the world around it with happiness, laughter, and warmth. 
Even your childhood meanderings yielded a view of youthful jubilance that many could only dream of. You wandered with such joy and laughter; it was so easy, it looked so wonderful. All the friends you have, all the hearts you touched, and all the love you gave; we wandered, but you had purpose.
I wish you could see the outpouring of love and kindness people have shown over the past two weeks. I wish you could see. You loved so much. You were bigger than life. In speaking to all your friends, they all said the same thing: you were the rock in their lives, the one that they counted on to be there, always; the one that always would bring joy to their days, especially when they were feeling down. You were larger than life; you gave joy to so many people. You loved.
But I want you to know that you were loved too. You ARE loved. You will forever be loved. Not just by me or mom and dad, but by your friends, your teammates, your co-workers; everyone you ever got to know, got them to smile, or got them to laugh. You are loved.
Even for all the grievances, the youthful misgivings, the strife you may have caused in one of your teenage angst driven cries of frustration, you were still the world to me- to many of us.
We went through the old photo albums this week. I couldn’t find a single picture of you with a sour look on your face. Always with a goofy look, a giant open-mouthed smile, or a look of delight. Not a single pouty face, frown, tear, or serious expression to be found. 
There is no better testament to showing just how full of life you were than looking through the pictures in the albums, as well as the ones your friends took of you at parties. 
For all the anger and frustration that I’ve harbored over the past two weeks about your foolishness and your stupid decision, the underlying feeling that has reigned is longing and sadness. I will never have you back. Through all the clichés of grieving, and searching for understanding, one thing holds true for me: I just wish I could talk to you one last time.
You would’ve been 19 today. Happy birthday little brother,
Love,
Evan
Words cannot express my gratitude and appreciation for all the love and support that you have shown me over the past week. I cannot stress enough how touched we are from the kindness and respect you have all shown us and it is a testament to how much Brodie affected our lives in the short time he was with us. My little brother could be a jerk at times, but that’s what little brothers are there for. He was my best friend growing up; we spent every day together, playing soccer in the backyard, jumping on the trampoline, trying to get our dog to jump in the pool, screaming at video games, getting in fights which usually ended in me punching his big mouth and him bawling to my mom. But we’d always make up. That’s what brothers are there for. He was the reason I am where I am today. I just so much wanted to beat him, I was jealous. Everything came so easy to him, be it because of his easy going personality, his natural gift for sports, or his love of everything and everyone. He drove me to strive for excellence, to try, to one-up him.
There’s so much I’m never going to do with him, so much I was looking forward to doing. I’ll never take him out for his first beer- he was 13 days shy of his 19th birthday. I’ll never get to see him get married, have kids, succeed in doing what he loved to do, never see his artistic dreams, come true. It’s hard to fathom just how much I will miss him. I’m an only child now.
I’m still in shock. Still sinking. I’ve been wandering the rooms we used to share, not knowing where I am going, just wandering.
I miss my brother.
The one thing I can take solace in is the fact that all the matter that ever was and ever will be has always been here. My brother has always been here, and will forever been here. In the air I breath, in the earth beneath my feet, in the blood coursing through my heart, and in the stars in the sky. He is with me.
