My brother, Adam, was one of the most amazing people I knew. Smart. Kind. Loving. Caring. Thoughtful. Always there for me no matter what I needed. Day or night, during a storm or heaven forbid a Packer Game, it didn’t matter. He would be there. When I was getting a divorce last year, he helped me pack, move, listened to me cry at all hours of the night, move again, change cities three times before I was settled, cry some more, and then cry again.
When he got married last year, it was one of the happiest times in our lives. He was 35 years old, found the love of his life, and was moving forward with trying to start a family. He was getting “to the good part,” the part he had always been waiting for. The part of life he always wanted. A wife. Children. His own little family. He was living on the lake and had a plan - a good plan, the best plan.
Despite the changes and challenges going on in my personal life, he was always there. No matter what. He was my original Partner-In-Crime, the OG Cop to my Robber, my Ride or Die, and often just my unspoken best friend that I loved more than life itself. This world - my world, his world, our world - would have been crumbling around us and it didn’t matter. We had each other despite being a few cities apart.
He was the one constant in my life, never changing, always loving, always caring, always there.
And now he’s not.
COVID-19 came and ruined everything.
Adam was snatched up by COVID on April 11th, 2020.
My brother. The one who understood me. The person who I would silently communicate with across the room with just a look. My snapchat buddy. My puppy-dog loving brother. My just-married-and-starting-a-family-brother. Gone.
I can’t go into the details of how the disease got him, or what it was like to say good-bye for my 15-minutes in the hospital, or how lonely and isolating this whole experience has been having this happen in the middle of a pandemic. It’s too personal. Too painful. Too…. everything. Just know this has been the singularly most profound and devastating experience of my life. Grief has hit me like a freight train fueled by crack on an all-night bender determined to rob me of all of my faculties, and I’m still just now recovering some of them (like my ability to write and communicate effectively and do simple math).
Adam was my favorite person in the whole world. More than a brother, but my very first friend, my best friend.
I miss you Big Bro. Save me a seat wherever you are. Love, your Lil Sis.