I am an only child, complete with all the trappings, both
good and bad.
Perhaps being imbued for decades with the confidence (arrogance?) and the steadfast belief
that everything I did or said was magical, miraculous, and utterly extraordinary
(thanks, mom!) staved off the
loneliness, the sense of isolation that accompanied a bedroom full of perfectly
organized, undamaged toys and an entire houseful of spaces that I could call my
own, my territorial claims perennially unchallenged.
(Incidentally, I should mention that I actually do
have a half-brother out there who I was fortunate enough to meet once, a
lifetime ago—and whose facebook page I still stalk with rabid frequency—but I’ll
save that for another story, another day…)
The fact is, I longed
for a brother or a sister beside me
growing up—a familial partner to accompany me along life’s journey. Someone to make faces at when my mom was maddeningly
out of touch, someone to loan me their albums and teach me the latest dance
moves, someone to threaten bodily injury to errant suitors or educate me about
the relative merits of Tampax® vs. Stayfree®.
Sadly, I was left to navigate these challenging waters alone.
(This is probably why my mom
still wants to slap me when I roll my eyes at her, my only dance move is an unholy
hybrid of ‘The Running Man’ and ‘The Cabbage Patch’, and despite years of solitary
research, I’m still left befuddled by the plethora of lady products available to me and
usually just grab the first box I see.)
My hope faded as the years passed and my mother’s egg countdown dwindled;
I learned to survive the only child way—by making everything all about myself
and learning to like it. That is, until
the day I discovered that I was not alone after all—I’d been the victim of a
cruel and elaborate conspiracy: I had a twin brother and we had been separated
at birth. (Cue dramatic soap-opera music.)
To shorten a very long and circuitous story, suffice it to say that
I had been privileged to find work at an enchanted suburban high school for a
fistful of years. It was in my time
spent there, collaborating with wonderful department colleagues and teaching fantastic
young learners, that I stumbled upon my long-lost brother.
The clues were everywhere, and yet I missed every single one: the identical
azure eye color, the same thick, sandy-brown hair (though, in my defense, after years of tinting, bleaching, and coloring
my own locks, I’d honestly lost all sense of what my natural color even was), the inexplicable and
incurable addiction to all things Prince, John Irving, Seth MacFarlane, and film
analysis—these were just a few of our curious connections. His wit was sardonic;
satirical, but not cruel. His eye for
detailed observations was uncanny. I
lost track of the times I sat, stupefied by the coincidences that left me
screaming silently “Get. Out. Of. My. Head!” It was not until my final moments
working with this brilliant, hilarious, compassionate man that the tragic truth
fully revealed itself to me: Our birth
certificates simply had to be a lie.
Cosmic, cruel circumstances drove us apart, but I continued to follow my
suspected kin electronically—reading his blogs, following his tweets, scanning
his status updates—each entry was another confirmation of my suspicions. There was no way that a random stranger could
reflect this much of what I believed and who I believed I was and NOT be related to me by some measure.
(Next you’ll be telling me
that Chelsea Handler ISN’T my evil, only-moderately more attractive clone, or
that Adam Levine ISN’T singing all those songs about me! Now
who’s crazy?)
I hesitate to say too much at this point, but I’ll give you a
hint: Said twin has succumbed to my delusions and embraced the irrefutable
certainty of our ancestral heritage—we have begun crafting a joint venture with
great alacrity. What will it be? I can’t specifically say quite yet—but I know that it will be amazing.
(I mean, if we’re this
astonishing separately, just imagine
what we’ll accomplish if we unite
our powers! The universal implications
are staggering.)
Your final clue:
We are neither hedonistic hippies nor are we ascetic
navel-gazers…we’re simply two kids born in the 70’s, loving the 80’s, maturing in
the 90’s, commenting on the new millennium.
We have families we adore and lives we cherish. We are music lovers who listen to The Killers
while we wear our Barry Manilow T-shirts without irony. We are literature-loving educators who read
contemporary publications with impunity.
We are cinematic snots who worship at the altars of Fellini, Welles, and
Kubrick but are unafraid to voice our allegiance to the wit of the latest Will
Ferrell foray. (Okay, we may be unafraid, but perhaps we are a wee bit embarrassed…)
The point is, we’re out here living this life right
alongside you, straddling the same chasmic (<-not a word, but you’ll figure out sooner or later that I take great
literary license and make these things
up all the time) divide between the “Good Ol’ Days” and the “Here and Now”
that you are. We’re just trying to make
sense, make meaning, or make a hella good time of it all.
If we found one another after all these years, perhaps there
are even more of us out there—sometimes they’re called “cults”, we prefer “communities”. All semantics aside, we’re drunk on this
Kool-Aid and wondering: won’t you join us for a glass...?
[For a sample of what you’ll be in for, check out my
brilliant “brother” at his blog:
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