April 18th was my brother Ric's birthday. He somehow managed 53 of them, before his, his what?-alcoholism, mental illness, poverty, loneliness, shame-killed him in August of 2008. The medical examiner found blood in his brain and blamed his death on a "brain bleed.” He ran out of gas a block from his trailer, and fell when he got out of his car. We know this because someone in his neighborhood saw him get up and limp to his place. I don't want to call it his home. Crash pad will do.
A cop I called opened the door, because we hadn't heard from him in weeks, because we were pretty sure he was on another binge, because I couldn't stand waiting and not knowing. Once the cop and I got inside, I only got a glimpse of my brother before broad shoulders blocked me from going any closer. He'd been dead a day before we found him. I called my brother Drago, and he and our neighbor Ben came right away. Drago stayed for the coroner and all that followed that day. Ben drove me home, because no one thought I should drive.
Ric’s life had been full once; a wife, two kids, a renovated Victorian on a quiet street only a few blocks from the bay.
Ric had a day job that he was good at that paid the bills, and nights he played drums. The best drummer in the Panhandle, they said. All the music people around here knew him. A lot of people loved him, too, because he was easy-going, funny, liked almost everybody. His hair turned gray early and he wore it in a long pony-tail. Tall, lanky, always in a t-shirt or layered up with flannel if the calendar said it was winter, he looked like a rocker, but not fierce-kind. He sang, too, but drums were his thing.
It took about fifteen years before alcohol stripped everything, even music,(the shakes) away. I don't know how he lasted that long. Blackouts, fights, hellish weeks of sobering up and making a stab at normal life, and eventually, another binge. About a month before he died, he got himself together and spent a weekend in Pensacola with his daughter and grand-daughter. The visit was good and I was so glad he'd been able to do that. I think he was ashamed, though, that he'd had to take a bus-six hours each way. A car would have gotten him back and forth in two.
Of course, by then shame was a constant, unless he was drunk enough to pass out.
During our twenties, Ric and I lived in Albuquerque. For a year or so we shared an adobe place in Old Town. My favorite thing was to go to "Okies," on Rt.66, when Ric's band was playing. I'd usually drink too much and my brother and his wife would make sure I got home okay, because neither one of them were in to getting smashed. God, or something-I sure as hell don't know-brought me to a time when I couldn't keep going with Johnny Walker Red and I quit drinking. That was almost thirty years ago for me, but my little brother never could stay stopped and I don't think he minded dying a bit. Ric's okay now. Peaceful, looking out for the rest of us, telling jokes, playing drums, himself again.
