Brothers
Bill Wetzel
She never saves her brother. Instead, she’s a voyeur, watching, studying him. When he falls, she isn’t there to pick him up. This is not to say she doesn’t love her brother. She does. But we cannot say this for sure. We cannot say anything, because she refuses to show this. We can only see her brother through the aperture of a cold lens. View him from a distance as she views him. As she studies him. We can love him or not love him, however we do so not as a sister or brother, but as an invested viewer. We feel about him as a film watcher feels for a protagonist or antagonist. Our love or hate or indifference lasts only as long as our viewing pleasure. He is not our brother. And she is not our sister. Whatever reaction we have for them eventually depletes. And we move on.
By contrast, he searches for his brother. Wanders the streets for him. His brother haunts his dreams. Haunts his life. When he finds him, he picks him up. Brings him back home. He does this time and time again. We do not just know that he loves his brother, but we love him too. He does not show us his love, he takes us along with him. We are not simply invested viewers this time, we are part of the story. We feel about his brother as if he is our brother. And we are the ones out searching for him. We pick him up. We bring him home. He is our brother too. They both are. Our concern and love for them never leaves us. And we never leave them.
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Bill Wetzel is a writer & the curator of the Good Oak Bar Reading Series in Tucson, Arizona. He is the November 2016 Customer of the Month for Seven Cups Tea House, and claims to be the first member of the Blackfeet Tribe to summit Mt. Lemmon. He also can't wait to find out "Who Shot America?" in the first episode of our country’s upcoming final season.