Monday Morning Rant (12)

Please indulge me as I forgo my usual cant in the Monday Morning Rant. Some things occur in life which thrust aside our irritations and impatience and lead us to a more reflective mood.
Thank you.

I was an only child and so was my brother. Actually, he’s my half brother and he was raised in my father’s house. My mother and I lived wherever she found a teaching job. He is also thirteen years younger, to the day. By the time he was in primary school, I was off making my way in the world and as far from Iowa as I could get. It never dawned on me how much effect I had on him until we were 31/18 years old. He had admired the uniform, the travel, the fresh new job managing a furniture store in Boulder, CO, the new house (GI bill,) the wife, the kids and all the rest of the suburban dream. At his earliest opportunity, he joined the Navy and started the process of emulating who I later learned was his “role model.”

As he aged, our relationship grew stronger and we edged toward that point where we developed as men together. His training in the Navy served him well and he parlayed the skills learned into increasingly better and better positions representing appliance manufacturers. We have never lived in the same house so many of the usual childhood events often shared by siblings are alien to us. At the most, I see him once or twice a year and we have a high old time.

At 62 years, he is a physical specimen to be admired. At 6’3”, trim to fault, he plays full court basketball, hand ball, and is a world class skier. You’ve seen the guys on TV who have helicopters deposit them on the virgin snow on mountain tops and as the chopper departs, commence the down hill run. That’s him! His only athletic fault is his failure to best his ageing brother at golf. It has become a family joke. Fortunately, he is married to a wonderful woman, also a representative at the national level for appliance purveyors.

All in all, it would be safe to conclude that he has it made. He has every needful blessing and then some.

Having read this far, you can imagine my shock last week when he called to tell me he was in the hospital. The last time he made such a call was in 1979 when he suffered a severe case of “road rash” due to the failure to manipulate his moto-cross bike successfully. This issue is even more difficult to deal with.

He had been suffering from some severe headaches over the last couple of months and had been hospitalized for testing and observation. The result, after dismissing some preliminary false diagnoses, was cancer in the lower reaches of the esophagus which had metastasized to the brain stem and produced blockage responsible for the headaches. The severity of that distress is pain so great that after 5 to 7 minutes it leaves him exhausted, whereupon he falls asleep to recover. He will start chemotherapy this coming week. I will probably be going to Chicago to be with him very soon.

Meanwhile, I beseech each and every reader to remember him and his family in your prayers. His name is Craig Moon and given the power of prayer (see prior post) I have every confidence that God will respond appropriately within the reach of His will. Thank you for your faith, love and caring.

In His abiding love,

Cecil Moon