my careless contagion

I have two older brothers: Jason and Jonathan. This post is about the middle brother, Jon. I've talked about some of the abuse I suffered in my childhood. Most of that abuse — the longest-running and most profound — took place at the hands of Jon.  The pictures directly above and below were taken in Florida many moons ago. My family would go to a condo owned by the company my father worked for during Christmas vacations. We did that many years with varying degrees of completeness. Sometimes Jason could join us, sometimes my grandma came. But it was always a bunch of white Nebraska folks (okay, Gramma wasn't from Nebraska) getting burned by the sun and eating a lot of key lime pie and seafood. Looking at these pictures, something is clear. I mean, besides the fact that at one point I changed which side I parted my hair. No, I mean the legacy of my relationship with my brother is not simple. It is as I would describe his behavior: bipolar. We were friends much of those ...

The author with a full-blown case of the Blatz circa 1978. You can tell when you're talking to a real alcoholic because they'll identify themselves as one, even after going years without drinking. The mechanisms that make them an alcoholic were there before they started drinking, as well. I consider myself an alcoholic who doesn't drink. My father was an alcoholic. Well, he still is. But he stopped drinking many moons ago. It's been said that people use alcohol as an excuse to do and say what they want to do and say; it's okay because they were drunk or buzzed and didn't mean it. It's like kids saying mean things on the playground and then, "Just kidding," making it even worse because why are you crying when I was just kidding? It's a one-two punch. Well, my dad was a womanizer, too. Swore like I've heard no one else swear. In fact, I've never seen anyone get as angry as my father. I thought he was going to kill one of my ...