ode to my brudder

My little brother just turned (ha...I originally typed turded...subliminal message?) the Big Two Two, and will be graduating this May from Washington State University with a degree in Kinesology. For all of his great accomplishments, I give you, MY DORKY BROTHER, DAVID:

-When David was a wee David, we had a secret language. This was before he could talk and we lived in the Wisconsin house (so I was younger than three, making him less than one). Looking back, I'm not entirely sure if we could communicate, or if I just really loved my new little brother. The only think I remember was "avah" was "hot."

-When David was in preschool, he loved dinasaurs. I think he still does, on some level. But one of the cutest memories of him was when we were driving to Minnesota and he was listening to his Wee Sing Dinasaurs tape and singing along. He didn't think we could hear him, and he sang horribly, but my mom and dad and I got to share in the secret smug smiles and collectively think "get a load of this kid!?, where did he come from?"

-Since I had to go to David's soccer games, I decided to make the most out of it by trying to embarass him as much as possible by cheering really loudly and saying stupid things. I almost got kicked out of a game by yelling at a kid who was clearly faking being hurt.

-During my senior year, we went on a school overnight leadership retreat. At the end there is all this cheesy "oh you mean so much to me" stuff and hugging. Usually, I don't really go for that kind of thing. But David was there, and he had just started to become an interesting person (instead of the useless dolt he had been since he was 5), and I realized how much I was going to miss him when I was going to college in a few short months. So I succombed to being huggy and told hime that I loved him and hugged him. Sniff. He was a trooper and hugged me back, though he probably thought I was going soft in the head.