As near as he came to death, I remembered nothing of his stay at the public hospital or the weekend during which his life slowly dwindled before our eyes. Perhaps it was a lack of awareness on my part combined with a degree of exclusion, due to my young age, from the facts and seriousness of the affair that I suffered from such a dearth of recollection; at any rate, my consciousness was jarred into reality only after Todd had reached Mayo Clinic and a noon-hour phone call from Dad to my mom caused me to comprehend the grave plight in which my brother was stranded. As Mom hung up the phone, I gasped, "Todd's not going to die, is he?" This, finally, was reality; among the dish of peaches, carton of milk and loaf of bread that decorated the kitchen table, it stuck in my throat like peanut butter.
I never forgot that lunch, nor the ignorant bliss which departed when reality caught up with me. A selfish person suffers insignificant wounds, for his shallow love is generated only toward himself; however, when one is able to extend his love and concern beyond himself, the pain is much deeper. I learned that the world did not revolve around me; I controlled nothing. Just as I had been virtually oblivious to my brother's failing health, so was the world oblivious to me. Life became larger than it had been as my eyes gradually opened, widening the scope through which I gained my image of existence. Pain or no pain, I did not wish to go through life with my eyes closed to hardship, for only pure ignorance was bliss. It seemed that change was the only certainty in life. If I could instill that thought in my mind, growing up would prove to be less of a battle.
Todd recovered slowly and after regaining his strength returned to the university at the beginning of the next semester. Complications caused by ill health no longer wreaked havoc upon his plans, and under the protective wing of medication he successfully completed his education without further set-backs.
The following summer, Todd traveled to Mayo Clinic once again for restorative surgery on his nose. His illness caused the cartilage to dissolve completely, making a noticeable recess. The surgery was the last of the weightier consequences of Todd's disease though, it too, possessed few endearing qualities.
Todd would never be free of the drugs, for they alone allowed him to survive. It did not appear that my brother's life would ever again be "normal," but that, I later found, depended on one's definition of the word.
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Chapter 4
Fifth Grade
"To maintain a friendship, one must have unrelenting endurance, yet should never need the companionship of another so desperately as to justify the acceptance of a flagrantly inconsistent personality."