Big Brother

          My father tried to put the oxygen mask back over my mother's face knowing deep down it was the only thing that he could do to save her life. Bile had leaked into her system and her blood pressure was falling. I stood there watching my parents fight for the last time. I knew it was going to be the last time when she pulled the mask away from her face saying, “It’s too hard Ralph, it’s too hard.” These were the last words I heard my mother say. That was Monday. I spent as much time as I could with her that week as she lay there sedated with the mask on.. Everyone thought she might pull through, but I knew. I remember seeing her earlier that year as she waited for her exit. She looked so tired. Her pain and my pain was something that we could discuss and relate too. I called my brother, he was almost never around and always thought he was being excluded from family events. Even though my memory was of him always leaving before an event started. I called him on that Wednesday and with a swollen throat that I could barely breathe through, I uttered. “I want to spend as much time with her as I can because I don’t think she is going to make it.” He said, “No!” and showed up later that night.
         My oldest brother, who I thought was so cool at the beginning of my freshman year of high school. He had long blonde hair, played on the varsity tennis team, and could get any girl he wanted. He turned me on to music like Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Yes. I though he was quite together, however as I grew up got married, had a son, got an education, got divorced, he did next to nothing. My heart broke as I heard he was arrested for assaulting a police officer in Palms Springs. I had to drive up and look for him in the caves above the strip. I didn’t find him.