Hey Little Bro,

I know you’re probably wondering why I’m writing this versus telling you upfront, I don’t know how quite to start this conversation at times. Trust me; it’s something that’s on my mind all of the time. I’m not sure where to start, so I guess I’ll start from the beginning.

I think you know this already, but I always wanted an older brother. I had older cousins; you know that, but we stopped talking to them for a few years, and I never was able to have someone take me under their wing for too long. It was always kind of a drag.

When our sister was born, I was not looking forward to it as much because, at the time, I was (probably still am) incredibly selfish. I wanted to have someone to play me in basketball, and I could run plays with them like Tim Duncan and David Robinson, eventually becoming Shaq and Kobe. (Side note, I’m not sure which one of us would’ve been Shaq and Kobe, but I probably would’ve had to be Kobe, I can shoot better than you.) While I adjusted and tried to be a good brother to her, I just thought that this meant being a reliable protector for her. That wasn’t exactly what I considered to be fun. I was in the third grade when mom and dad told me that you were going to be born soon. It was great news, but even at nine years old, I thought that once you were born, you would be able to play two-square with me (mom and dad weren’t cutting it anymore). You can imagine my disappointment when I had to wait for you to get good at things.

The moment you were born, I remember only trying to help you walk as fast as possible. If I could help you skip the crawling phase, I would have. Once you started walking, I wanted you to start sprinting and skip the whole jogging thing. You probably recall our cousin, who was the same age as you. Well, I wanted you to be ahead of the curve from him always, and even though I never said that out loud, I would make sure I received updates to make sure you would be able to beat him in a 1v1 game in whatever sport. My point is, I was on a mission to make you the best teammate in the world. You were going to be my Kobe, eventually passing me up. Ironically, that probably has already happened, but we’ll touch on that in a few.

I’m not sure if you remember, but I used to take you to my friend’s house all the time if I could, and you were always super well behaved. I felt guilty because you would still be down to come over to watch us play video games, probably hoping for the day that we’d ask if you wanted to join us. That day came pretty late, and if you recall, the day you did ask if you could play, my friend tried to go off on you. I never was so upset in my entire life. I never told you that the next time I saw him without you, I had a conversation about it and said to him that I never wanted him to talk to you like that again because messing with you meant he was messing with me. Since then, we stopped going over that friend’s house as frequently.

That’s when we began going to the park to practice basketball as often as we could. As much as I knew I had to work on my game, my primary focus was to teach you how to make plays and call the shots as the primary ball-handler. We created three different strategies, and I would show you what each did right on the basketball. I went through so many moments in school in which I never had enough confidence to try and risk being rejected for something like the basketball team. I would make sure that would not happen to you. Eventually, once you started playing in elementary school, you were arguably the best player on the team. I was so hard on you from the beginning, and although I crossed the line most times, I would only do it to make sure you got better. You did. Now, you can almost beat me in 1 on 1.

You might be asking yourself, “why are you telling me this now?” I’m not quite sure I know the answer. I know that since you’ve gotten older and have started becoming the young adult you are, it seems to get harder for us to be on the same page. I know I have my faults for most of it, but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t want to go back to the days where we would play “Ultimate Avengers” together and listen to the first Mana album.

I used to tell all of my friends that my life wouldn’t get started until you graduated high school because I would feel like I would have accomplished watching you get through that phase. Watching you walk across that graduation stage wearing my alma-mater colors was a moment that I’ll never forget, and I’m not sure I could ever be more proud of that feat.

My only ask of you is this; don’t ever forget that your sister and I have always looked out for you in every way possible. Even when you weren’t aware, we always wanted to make sure you were taken care of so you could be the one to shine for the entire family. We still protect you from this very day. Try and remember that we all are capable of making mistakes. Talking down on others because they don’t know as much about a subject or disagree with you isn’t cool. Not being able to take a joke without throwing a smartass comment back is lame. Learn how to get whooped in Fifa without throwing a fit. Accept the fact that the three-point shot is an acceptable way to lose a game. 

Pretty soon, I’m going to grow up and start getting my shit together. What that looks like, I’m not quite sure. I know that it might mean that we’ll get less time to bullshit (in the right way) as much as we can. I want to know that once I go on my way, we’ll be able to do everything we dreamed of when both become fathers and have our kids in a basketball league of their own. Remember that you still have to be available to be my future best man, no matter what, that role is always yours.

Love you, brother.