You Can Do Better Than That

Yeah, and so can I

Perspective

Left unresolved, a poor one takes hold like a disease and ravages the body.

Here’s a story.

The phone rang a little after 8:00 a.m. one morning. Unusual, but I assumed it might have been my work calling. When I answered, the voice on the other end sounded breathless. It was from Gerry. He said only four words. “Can you help me.”

It was the first time in my twenty-eight years that my older brother ever asked me for anything. “Are you at home?”, I asked plainly. The fear in his voice was palpable.

I told him I’d be there in thirty minutes and grabbed my car keys. On my drive to midtown Toronto, I came to the sudden realization of the role reversal. Strange that I hadn’t considered it before, but I was forced to accept quickly what it meant to become the big brother.

At six feet and two hundred plus pounds, Gerry was usually presented as a solid mass of humanity. The sickness, over the last fifteen years, had taken away his ability to maintain an equilibrium. Fluctuations were routine.

I arrived at the front door of his ground floor apartment in an old, decrepit brownstone and knocked. The figure that opened the door was barely a shadow of his former countenance. The stench of days old cigarette resin nearly blew me into the opposite wall, and I was a smoker at the time.

I stared in ghastly awe of my brother’s emaciated figure. I hadn’t seen him for more than a month. His schizophrenic mania caused him to disappear, again, for some time. He looked bloody awful.

“What do you need?”, I asked sympathetically.

“Can you take me to the Clarke?”, he simply asked.

The Clarke Institute was Toronto’s major Mental Health and Addiction Centre at the time. I walked with him to my car and we set off down Spadina Road. It was a warm June day in 1988, but Gerry was shivering.

“Are you sure you want to go to Clarke?” I asked, concerned. I’d seen him through various discomforts, but this time it seemed different, forboding.

Gerry was experiencing one of his rare, lucid moments as he explained that the Centre would be the best place form to be right now. When we arrived he was admitted immediately, and I was allowed to escort my brother to the third floor. We embraced before I left, barely able to choke back the tears. I broke down before I reached the car.

Three days later, my parents, my oldest brother, and I were called into a meeting at the Toronto General Hospital were Gerry had been transferred.

The news came like a cinderblock hitting each of us squarely in the chest. Cancer was the diagnosis, and the disease had run rampant into the lining of his lungs.

There was little time to process. Gerry passed away with his family at his bedside ten days later. My father, who was in the same hospital at the time of Gerry’s death, died three years later.

The five years that followed are a blur. Through all of it, I kept rehashing every thought I had about ‘my situation’, the majority of it negative, and I remembered every nasty or unkind thing I ever said to my brother.

I’ve done my share of self-pity and doubt. My story is only one of many who have been struck with tragedy in their lives. If you are one of them, I feel your pain. It hurts like hell, and then I remember…

I’m not alone, thankfully. And, I’m not that special.

Pain and suffering are not a matter of degrees for others to judge. Everyone processes grief in a different way. But, we seem to put an unbalanced emphasis on our own suffering over others. Is my pain more pitiful than someone else’s? Not so much.

Life Goes On…

Easy to say I know, but it’s the only one we’ve got. A couple of perspectives changed for me over the years and, being completely honest, it took far too long for me to figure them out.

When self-pity creeps in, it too can grow like cancer, especially when it’s festered by outside forces. The “Let’s get together and feel sorry for ourselves” club will have to move on without me. Sure, there are important issues to discuss, with measured and reasonable dialogue.

Complaining about our lot has become a national sport, and nothing seems out of bounds. Well, guess what kids? There are millions, no, billions of people worse off than we are. I try to remember that every time I want to bitch about something banal, like the price of toilet paper.

Let’s not forget, there are people with real mental health issues mostly suffering in silence. Banging on about how injured you are about, I don’t know, like lesser writers getting published over your proclaimed greatness, is akin to taking a handicapped parking spot when you’re perfectly capable of walking the extra twenty feet.

Does “Be the better person” have any meaning anymore?

The other thing I’ve come to realize is, we need to take more responsibility for our words. As writers, words are paramount. But, what about when we speak, or text, or generally communicate with others?

Language can be vile when left unchecked. We’re all guilty of flapping off before thinking it through. Everyone is going through stuff.

Man, I wish people would read what they write first before they push send. Is that really what you want to say to another human being? Think carefully, before it’s too late.

Oops! Look at me. Complaining about the behaviour of others.

Yep! We can all do better. How about it?

As always, thanks for taking the time. It’s always appreciated. You’re welcome to find more here.