THE WIND PHONE
My Brother Will Never Unwrap Another Gift
A bittersweet Christmas is as good as it gets in our family
TW: suicide
This coming Christmas Day would’ve been my brother’s 62nd birthday. Tony hated sharing his birthday with the world. He’d get combined presents, unlike the rest of us. “This is for your birthday and Christmas” — he must have heard that a hundred times.
If only he could hear those words again…
In the lead-up to Christmas, as I read all the stories of how to deal with difficult relatives, how to survive the holiday season or joyful stories of celebration and gratefulness, my feelings are on a sleigh ride to the Twilight Zone — not a vampire thing.
Tony had forty-two birthdays of combined presents before he took his life.
In March 2004, in a prison cell that would have been temporary had he just waited a few more weeks, he hanged himself with a green bed sheet sometime around noon, said the coroner’s report a year later. When he was found, Dr Phil was on the small TV in his room. I wondered what episode it was, and if it influenced his decision.
How strange to include that detail in the report.
My brother’s story reads like a Shakespearean tragedy — a masterpiece of drama, chaos, humour, love, and death. He dreamed of Hollywood and being the next Mel Gibson or Hugh Jackman, but he was more like Steve Irwin — a wrangling crocodile type of guy.
But he wrangled demons instead
Tony was two years older than me and, as kids, we were partners in crime. Until real crimes were committed — his, not mine — and our world split apart.
By the time he was fifteen, he was an alcoholic. With dozens of petty thefts under his belt, and a string of girls in his wake — one pregnant — he could have been Hugh Hefner if he’d had the smarts for it. He had the right cunning.
But at that age, his biggest crime — in my eyes — were the things he made me feel. Things that brothers are supposed to protect their little sisters from.
Boys will be boys, as the saying goes
In her autobiography, Clementine Ford, an Australian feminist writer, broadcaster and public speaker, writes about the dangers of ingrained toxic masculinity.
I could only get through about half the book. It was all too much. The cobwebs cocooned me, and I had trouble breathing. I needed something trivial to take my mind off it. Colleen Hoover — an American romance author — sorted that out.
Triggers diverted. Thank you, frivolity.
I don’t really buy into what Clementine is selling. I believe boys, like girls, become what their conditioning dictates. Then we grow up and become whatever we want to be. If we’re lucky, wisdom takes the lead sooner rather than later.
Unfortunately for Tony, some people are just not destined to see life through. Some people never get over their upbringing, and things etched into the psyche aren’t easily repaired.
“I’m sorry to have to inform you your brother died in custody.”
Not a phone call you ever want to receive. Not words I ever expected to hear. And what made it even more shocking was that no one knew he was in jail. For many years he’d been estranged from the family since ‘falling off the wagon’ as they say.
Tony had eleven years of sobriety that were over in a day. He’d starred in a beer commercial — the new face of a popular brand.
“I can’t drink that,” he told the director, “I’m an alcoholic.”
The director laughed and then saw the look on Tony’s face.
“Oh, you’re serious. Ok then, spit it out on my cut,” came the reply.
Tony swallowed instead of spitting.
He’d tell the story later.
One. Innocent. Swallow. That was all it took. A sliding doors moment. A life irreversibly changed.
He’d created a good life during those eleven years. Somehow he’d found the strength to slay his demons. He’d quit drinking and drugs, married, had three daughters, and built a home with his own hands. He was a master builder.
Tony was a lot of things to many people, so imagine what else he might have been had he not cut it short… A grandfather is one of them. He has six grandchildren now, who will never know the sound of his voice or hear his Donald Duck impersonation. He was good at cartoon characters.
At least a hundred people were at his funeral — probably more. It was standing room only by the time the crowd settled. There weren’t enough seats in that little country town crematorium. Walls of windows looked out over sunny grass paddocks as dairy cows munched away happily as if it were a normal day.
Even Robbie Williams’s Angels sounded sadder than usual — is that even possible? Not a dry eye in the house.
But I’m getting ahead of myself
I’d arrived early. The open casket was for close family only, not public viewing. Just as well. No amount of makeup could cover his last ever crime. Not for the faint of heart that’s for sure. But I’m an iron maiden when it comes to matters of tragedy, a skill you only learn with a lot of practice.
Where others fall apart, I come together. It’s not a strategy — it’s just survival, I suppose.
My mother asked the unthinkable, but I was already prepared. The unthinkable runs deep in our family so nothing surprised me; it still doesn’t.
And then it was just me and Tony, alone for the last time.
I snapped away with my camera as promised for Mum. “Sorry Tony, not your best glamour shots, I’m afraid,” I said quietly under my breath, hoping to God no one would see me.
Tony’s sister the weirdo, like WTAF?
I stopped when I knew Mum would have her fill, enough photos of her middle son to last a lifetime. She’d only need them for two more years before she gladly joined him. We didn’t see that coming, but that’s a whole other story.
And before I took my exit, I put my hand on Tony’s chest. Solid as a rock. What kind of irony was this? His face was stone-like, and his skin felt the same. I ran my fingers across his long brown eyelashes, so soft they made me gasp.
At least something felt real that day.
“I forgive you,” I whispered in his ear just before I walked away, even though I’d done it decades ago — the forgiving. But saying it out loud felt important, even if it fell on deaf ears. The speaking finally set it free.
This Christmas morning, I will wake as I have done the last nineteen Christmas mornings, melancholy and with my first thought of the day: happy birthday, Tony, and Merry Christmas, brother.
And if you’re dreading Christmas Day — because families can be hell, let’s face it — spare a thought for the ones long gone. They probably wish they’d had more time to be with relatives.
