By Scott Shephard
Not too long ago, I made reference to a song by James Taylor entitled “It’s Enough to Be On Your Way.” It is one of my favorite songs, in part because it enigmatically speaks to me about truth, loss, inspiration and celebration. While it seems to be about a woman named Alice, Taylor says in an interview that it is actually about his older brother Alex, who had died of alcoholism.
A year or so ago, I found a blog post which compared the story in Taylor’s song to the author’s story. The author, Jeff Meshel, had a sister who had died of lung cancer. They hadn’t been particularly close and it was long after she died that he realized how much he missed her. Jeff and his sister, Madie, did get together from time to time and he describes their relationship like this:
“She was the one person to whom I could open up completely and unguardedly — one quarter stranger on a plane, one quarter twin personality, one half unadulterated love.”
Meshel’s post about Taylor and about his own relationship to his sister is beautifully and powerfully written and I have re-read it many times, generally after I listen to “It’s Enough to Be On Your Way.” Last night both got me thinking about my own brother, Mike, who has lived in Berlin for many decades. He is 3 years older than I am and when we were growing up in Sioux Falls, we moved in completely different circles.
It may be shocking to hear this, but I don’t remember loving my brother when I was a kid and I don’t know if he loved me. That’s not his fault or our parents’ or anyone else’s. I don’t think I knew what love was way back then. I certainly couldn’t have expressed it and I’m not sure I would have recognized it if it had kissed me on the cheek.
Because of the distance between us, Mike and I see each other very rarely, but now, when we get together, I feel a love and warmth from Mike that is very real. I hope he feels the same from me. It might have been there all along and maybe it took me over 50 years to recognize it.
And finally, in the strange, free-associative way my mind works, there’s Brian and Jon, our two sons. I get the sense that their relationship isn’t at all like that of James and Alex, or Jeff and Madie or Mike and Scott. They live half a continent apart, see each other rarely and yet I think there is an affinity between them that I find satisfying.
How do we learn to be each other’s siblings and what that means? I can’t say that I got any lessons and I certainly didn’t give any. Maybe someone else reading this has the answer.
Honeywell Pentax SP500 Kodak Tri-X Pan, exposure unknown