Stories Along The Way

Have you ever looked back at your childhood and realized something you didn’t fully understand at the time?

I have.

My mother was a single mother raising five kids. My second-oldest brother was only one year older than me, but he took on responsibilities that most kids his age didn’t have.

He started working when he was only 12 years old.

He sold oranges on the street and donuts from a van before he was even old enough to have a driver’s license. He worked at a Chinese restaurant where they overworked him and underpaid him. He helped my mother sell tools at the swap meet and later worked as a delivery driver for a pizza place.

But what I remember most isn’t how many jobs he had. It’s what he did with the money.

My brother gave me $2 every day for lunch at school.

He also bought me my first pair of name-brand tennis shoes—black-and-white Vans. They were popular then, and I wanted a pair. He put shoes on layaway for me and my siblings and made payments until he could bring them home.

As a child, I just knew I had a cool pair of Vans. As an adult, I understand what those shoes represented.

My brother was only one year older than me.

While I was being taken care of, he was helping take care of me.

And even with the struggles, we had a happy childhood. We played, we laughed, and we enjoyed being kids. We didn’t live a luxurious life, but we had what we needed. Back then, I didn’t think about everything that had to happen behind the scenes to make that possible.

My brother was a child too, but in many ways, he carried responsibilities far beyond his years.

Today, we may not be as close as we once were. Life changes, and relationships change. But that will never take away the respect I have for him or how thankful I am for what he did for us.

The $2 for lunch means more to me today than it did then. So do those black-and-white Vans.

And maybe that’s what a person’s story really is—not only the big accomplishments or the moments everyone knows about, but the small things they did that someone else never forgot.

I’ve written before about the dash between the day we’re born and the day we die. That tiny dash holds an entire lifetime. When I think about my brother’s dash, I think about things like this.

A 12-year-old boy selling oranges.

A brother making sure his sister had $2 for lunch.

A pair of black-and-white Vans sitting on layaway until he could finish paying for them.

Those moments are part of his dash.

They may seem small to someone else, but they aren’t small to me. They tell me something about who my brother was long before either of us was old enough to understand it.

He was just a kid himself, only one year older than me, yet he helped give me a happy childhood.

And that is a part of his story worth telling.