Baby brother.

Today my little brother is twenty. I have two brothers (both younger) and today is Edward’s birthday. It makes me feel really old, possibly older than my own birthday did because I remember him being born, I remember carting him down the stairs before he could talk or piss standing up and making him breakfast. In a way I fathered him, which is weird because we had a perfectly brilliant dad (and still do). I took that responsibility on of my own accord and seeing him now, with a chinstrap beard, about twelve tattoos and flesh tunnels makes me realise that I did something right in taking him under my wing.

Our relationship as brothers has always been brilliant, we’ve had our moments; I recently threw a mug at him and he grappled me to the floor choking off my air, but that’s nothing compared to the amount of good time we share together. Edward has always been a rebel, always pushed the boundaries and that’s what makes him different to me (the safe bet) or Robb (the funny one), he will keep pushing and pushing and it is something I have come to greatly admire him for it, I wish I’d had the audacity to act the way he did and does in a number of different situations. People (my parents) get annoyed at him for not settling down, for being quite up in the air all the time, for not really knowing what he wants but the fact of the matter is that he’s still very young, and we all are, and at twenty I was running around Buckinghamshire with my trousers down. He’s only twenty and it takes a little later than that to prepare yourself for the world, it’s not the same as it was twenty/thirty years ago. We don’t have to get a job at sixteen and graft, we can afford the luxury of fucking about a bit, and that is largely down to the our parents, the generation who knew the feel of a hard day’s work when they were still minors. We’ll get there too, it’s a generational thing.

This morning (and I’m sure my brother will mind me telling you this but it’s doubtful he’ll ever read it and by the end of this paragraph you’ll understand why) Edward came into my room at seven and got in bed with me. There are very few people who can do that, and seem legitimate about it. I made him a cup of tea and he set about opening his presents. I got him a copy of the Sh*t My Dad Says book, based on our enjoyment of the Twitter page of the same name and as soon as he saw it he said: ‘Wahhh, a book’. Anyone else would get a smack round the head for that kind of insolence and disrespect but I can’t do it to him, he’s under my wing now whether we like it or not.

Happy birthday Edward you little punk.