Kevin is my Irish twin who...

...delivered the first man punch I ever received. I was in my sleeping bag because my parents were out and, as the oldest, I was the babysitter and my middle sister was in my bed. I put her there because she and Kevin were making all kinds of noise at the foot of my stairs. It was a dormer room so it had no door. You went up the flight of stairs and all you saw was my bedroom. I had told her to be quiet a few times and between her and Kevin, no one ever shut-up. I was in bed (where they should have been) and they were keeping me awake. We lived in a huge house and they could have gone anywhere to play. But since they wouldn't stop playing at the foot of my stairs, I brought Lori up to my room and put her to bed in my bed. I took out my sleeping bag and crawled into it. All of a sudden Kevin came up my stairs and started sucker punching me wherever he could and as hard as he could.

He got me in the face so hard that he ran down the stairs. I followed him down to get to the bathroom mirror and said to him, "I think you broke my nose!" He took one look at my face and responded, "I think I did too!"

Someone was in the downstairs bathroom so I held my face over the island counter in our kitchen. I couldn't just keep bleeding on the counter so I went upstairs to my parents bathroom. About that time my parents came home and my mom screamed when she saw all the blood in her kitchen. Someone must have told her what had happened and to who so I never saw her that night. I guess she went to bed. My father must have been punishing my brother because I don't remember seeing him either but I'm sure someone took a look at my nose. But, since my parents didn't believe in taking kids to the doctor unless the school demanded it, I never had that fracture treated but my nose was most assuredly broken and by morning, I was on my way to school with a fat nose and 2 black eyes. I don't ever remember getting an apology from my brother but by then, and continuing to this day, he had already stopped speaking to me unless he felt the need to call me some hideous name. If I had done anything to offend him, I certainly don't know what it was. And Lord knows my Irish family doesn't talk things out, most of the people in my family just don't speak to each other for years, decades or ever.

He may not remember this but when he was about 3, he and I would grab some dry cereal every morning and take it into the bathroom, put it under the old-fashioned radiator and wait for the ants to come out. We named them and considered them our pets. We named one Santa Claus and oddly, we saw him every single morning. I doubt that we were really convinced that Santa Claus was the same ant everyday, but we had fun pretending. That's the only time I ever remember playing with him. I don't even remember him talking to me after that.

I do remember what my mother wrote in my baby book. To paraphrase, she said, "You love your little brother and you're not at all jealous of him. You do things to him that you like people to do to you. You're so gentle with him that I know he's safe in your arms." I was 14 months old when he was born.

A while back he as in Tampa to go to a Bruce Springsteen concert. He knew that I was here and going to the same concert but he never got in touch with me, didn't offer to meet after the concert and made sure that I wasn't invited to the bar-b-que that my sister had for him the day after the concert. (Yes, the sister that he broke my nose for.)

He behaved businesslike to me at my mother's funeral in 2001 but I haven't heard from him since. He hasn't answered my calls in years. Just because I don't remember offending him doesn't necessarily mean I never did. But, if I did, he never told me and whatever it was, it couldn't have been so bad that he has forgotten his mother's first born child.

I don't expect him to be my best friend, but it would be nice to have a brother to chat with every so often.