Introspection

Hey all,

Yesterday I was checking out MySpace and I saw that my brother had uploaded a bunch of new pictures of his vacation with his step-daughter, Lexie. I pulled up the pictures and starting looking through them. In those pictures I saw something I had never seen before, and it was something I didn't know how to take. I saw my kid brother as an adult. Really for the first time.

I mean my brother is almost 28 years old and married. Hell I performed the wedding. He is raising a child with another on the way. But he was still just my kid brother in my eyes. Looking at those pictures and the way he was with Lexie really caught me off guard. My brother looked....natural. he looked like he had been playing the role of Father for years. I could feel genuine warmth and love in those pictures. I also saw a maturity that I had never noticed before.

Growing up our roles in our family were always well divided. I was the mature smart one, the responsible one. Gregg was always the brash, flighty one. The one prone to acting out and irresponsibility. Now I look at him and I don't see the same person. My brother is an adult.

That got me to thinking. What does that make me now? I don't feel any different than I did 10 years ago. I don't feel like I am almost 32. I still feel like a young adult, still following the same patterns that I have always done. I still read comic books and still follow my interests in movies and pop culture. Still prone to impulse buying and spending money on the things that I want.

Sure, I own a home and a nice car. I pay my bills and work hard at my job, things that you do when you get older. But short of owning a home, my brother is the same, plus he takes car of a family. I am also pretty sure that owning a home isn't to far away from his future. SO does this make me the immature one now?

I can't say that I want marriage and a family right now because I don't think that is a true statement. Sure I want to be in a relationship, but that is what I want it to be. I never really got the opportunity to just be in a relationship and all the fun of dating and courting. Marriage is a responsibility that I think I could handle, its just not something that I want to rush. I certainly don't know how I feel about children. I think that I could be a good dad if given the time, and when I was younger it was something I though was in my future. While I haven't, nor will I, closed the door on that yet, I can't help but think If I am mature enough to have them.

There is still so much I want go do, travel and learn, to write. A child tends to stop those dreams really fast, though to be fair, raises a whole new realm of hopes and dreams.

It is still a strange thing to think that my kid brother may be the mature one on the family. All I can do is try to find out what my identity is now and adapt. Every day is a new day, and everyday can lead to infinite possibilities.

End of Line.
Gerrad!