I recently made each of my three brothers a gift, an irregularly shaped piece of three-quarter inch thick walnut about seven inches square, with a two-inch by six-inch brass plaque.\u00a0 In front of the plaque sits a metal scale model 1996 John Deere riding lawn mower and four small sticks tied in a bundle.\u00a0 I worried these were a bit too ‘hokey’ and each one might end up in the back of a closet.\u00a0 Instead, each brother has theirs sitting out.\u00a0 Well, at least they’re sitting out when I visit.<\/p>\n
The idea to build these started last spring when my second oldest brother (I am the youngest) sent me a Disney DVD, a 1999 movie based on a true story.\u00a0 He called saying this movie reminded him of the oldest brother and me, who had spent substantial time together the past several months because he was ill, requiring several trips to be with him while hospitalized in California.\u00a0 It was one of the most wonderful movies I have watched; with memories, tears, and perspective on life’s real priorities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The movie is about two brothers, both in their late 70s, who had “said some unforgivable things the last time (they) met.”\u00a0 One brother learns the other had a stroke.\u00a0 He realizes “whatever it was that made me and Lyle so mad… don’t matter anymore.\u00a0 I want to make peace.”\u00a0 “My eyes are bad.\u00a0 I can’t drive.\u00a0 I don’t like someone else driving.\u00a0 And I’ve got to get out to my brother’s.” What does he do?\u00a0 He hooks up a tarp-covered trailer to his John Deere riding lawn mower and sets out on a 5 mile an hour journey through our country’s heartland.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His journey, during the fall harvest, is about the people he meets, the advice he offers, and the memories he recalls, all the while heading to his big brother.\u00a0 He spends several days in a small community, awaiting repairs of his lawn mower.\u00a0 A man offers to drive him the rest of the way but he declines saying, “I appreciate that. But I wanna finish this one my own way.”\u00a0 When waiting for the repairs, he offers unsolicited council to two bickering brothers explaining, “There’s no one knows your life better than a brother . . . hope I’m not too late . . . A brother’s a brother.”<\/p>\n
He also talks with a fellow World War II veteran, confessing the pain he has carried since the war.\u00a0 He was a forward sniper, often shooting at nothing more than a small blur of movement.\u00a0 He spotted one such German target, with ever so slight a movement in the grasses.\u00a0 He fired.\u00a0 The movement stopped.\u00a0 Later, as his unit pushed forward they found their scout shot in the head, everyone assuming a German sniper shot him, but they were wrong.\u00a0 The elderly man wept as he told his new friend of his permanent, painful regret.\u00a0 His friend, as only a fellow soldier who had seen the same war could do, offered him understanding and forgiveness.\u00a0 As he left this small farm community, he told his new friends, “I want to sit with Lyle, look up at the stars . . . like we used to do, so long ago.”<\/p>\n
One night, camping along the highway, a young woman runaway comes into his camp, frightened and hungry.\u00a0 He feeds her and while they are talking he asks her how far along she is.\u00a0 She explains she ran away because if her family found out she was pregnant they would hate her.\u00a0 He told her he thought she was wrong and recounted how, when his children were “little . . . I’d give each one of them a stick and say, ‘You break that.’\u00a0 Of course, they could real easy.\u00a0 Then I’d say, ‘Tie them sticks in a bundle and try to break that.’\u00a0 Of course, they couldn’t.\u00a0 Then I’d say, ‘That bundle . . . that’s family.”\u00a0 This is the quote engraved on the brass plaque sitting behind the John Deere riding lawn mower and the four bundled sticks, representing my three brothers and me.<\/p>\n
He finally coasts into his brother’s yard after 250 miles and six weeks on the road. He gets off his lawn mower and heads toward the house using his two canes to walk. As he nears the house hollering his brother’s name, he fears he may be too late. His brother comes out on the porch with his walker, dragging a barely useful right leg.\u00a0 As they stare at each other on the porch with tears in their eyes, the older brother says, “Alvin, did you ride that thing all the way out here to see me?”\u00a0 Alvin replies, “I did Lyle.”\u00a0 No more words are needed.\u00a0 They sit down in rocking chairs on the porch and look to the stars, speaking volumes in their silence.\u00a0 All is forgotten. All is forgiven. Family.\u00a0 Brothers.\u00a0 Unbreakable.<\/p>\n
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