Thursday, July 14, 2005

Teen no more

Today is my brother's 20th birthday, and the time of the year when for less than a month, he can brag that he's just a year younger than me.
My mom, being the sentimental person she is, has his baby picture out on the kitchen table, propped up next to his presents. It makes me think, not just about what an ugly baby he was (well, not hideous, just not cute), but about if my brother is the person I thought he'd become years ago.
When I was younger, I used to wonder what he'd be like in middle school, in high school, as an adult. Would my kid brother, who harassed me and my friends like he was an older brother, be in the popular crowd at school? Would he get good grades? Would he continue to be obsessed with remote control cars, bicycles, Mickey Mouse and video games? What would he look like? Tall like me? Short like my mom? What would he be?
Twenty years down the road, there's really no clear answer. Although the brother I see now might be completely different from the brother I saw as a 2-year-old, 10-year-old or 18-year-old, I just see him as Jesse.
Yes, the Mickey Mouse dolls have been given to charity and his fixation with bicycles has transformed to motorcycles, but to me he's not much different than the day he was born.
Just maybe not as ugly.

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