Life, the Universe and Good-byes

I think we can all agree that 2025 has been a year of fast-moving events and unexpected moments that bring in to question decisions made. Either made this year or previous years, we are at a point of endings and beginnings. Things that have been left unresolved are circling back for that needed conclusion.

Saturday, September 7, 2025, was like most Saturdays in my house. I woke up, made coffee, listened to my favorite news podcasts with my partner and around 10am started making breakfast. I was in the middle of cooking hashbrowns when my cellphone rang. Harborview Medical Social Worker popped up on the caller ID. I just stared and let it go to voicemail. I immediately listened to the message. She explained that she was trying to get ahold of family for a patient who was in the ICU. I knew before I called her back that it was my brother, Dallas. I had been expecting this call for much of our adult life. Dallas lived a life that would make most people terrified to sleep at night. He wasn't a bad person. When using, he associated with people that lived precarious lives. He lived a precarious life at times too. He self-medicated into addiction and pulled back out and fell back in many times. Somehow, I knew I would be the person to receive the phone call that the last time was his last time. He was too trusting, abused as a child and adolescent and self-medicated to escape the pain he didn't know how to face as a GenX white male living in Idaho.

Dallas at 3 years old

Within a few hours, we had loaded up our car and were headed to western Washington. I had called my other two brothers, my mom and Dallas's oldest daughter along with her mom. I hadn't spoken to any of my family aside from my mother since Dallas moved out of my house September 17, 2021. He butt-dialed me early in the morning after staying out all night as was the norm during the pandemic. He had fallen deep into his addiction during 2020/2021. His children came up for spring break March 2020 and never left. Their mom, his ex-wife been experiencing housing insecurity and simply stopped communicating for a few months. Dallas and I started working on him gaining custody right away (which he did July 2021) but as time went on, the shut down and increased payments for staying home made it easy for him to feed his addiction. We had discussed several times his drug use which he denied. I searched for ways to help him as he got skinnier and his face became full of lesions or burn marks on his lips. Our youngest brother and his wife visited fall of 2020 and they both noticed how skinny Dallas had become

An outing with my niece, nephew and son summer of 2020

Fall of 2021, I was at my wits end and when I heard the drug deal going down that morning, I had had it as I could hear the conversation. This time he strolled in around 10am and hadn't bothered to take his children to school again. I was upset and exhausted. His behavior erratic. I said all the things that had been building up and that was it. After that, my other two brothers and mom swept the crazy behavior under the rug, made excuses for the drug use and never truly addressed the addiction. I was vilified so I bowed out of family for four years. It just felt easier. My partner had gotten a job in San Franscisco in 2020 and when they started requiring one day a week in office, we moved to the Bay Area summer of 2022. Suddenly, I was away from everyone in my immediate family and the responsibilities of being the person everyone came to for help went away. I started to 'thaw out' as I call it. The healing process I started many years prior had kicked up to high gear. I just didn't realize it until recently. Until I needed to call my family to let them know that our brother or their son or their dad was in the ICU and that he was not likely going to make it.

My brothers and I, growing up in south Idaho circa 1980. Dallas is holding our cat (of course) I'm currently fostering his two cats.

Dallas was buried 4 years to the day from when he left my house in anger and drove to western Washington to live out the last four years of his life. The last time I saw him alive. I have thought several times if I had just not said anything, we could have had a relationship the way it was until he passed but life doesn't work that way. That morning, at that moment, I set a boundary that we both realized neither of us could go back on. This has become part of my healing journey.

Dallas's Celebration of Life. Photo taken Oct 2024 at the pumpkin patch.

 I loved my brother very much. This is a grief I have never experienced. We were close. We were always very close. He would call me all the time as we navigated adulthood after a tumultuous childhood. He was 4 years younger than me. I worked in hospitality for 20 years and after a while, he too, worked at some of the nicest restaurants in town. After about 10 years in hospitality, I grew to love wine and the art of selling it. He loved learning about wine. We would often compare notes. I finally graduated college with a BA in Anthropology and then a MS in Public Administration and Applied Anthropology. He made sure he was at both graduations. He was the only other sibling to achieve two college degrees- An AA in general studies and AA in Political Science. He wanted to become a nurse and help people. He was always interested in helping people. In the end, he helped at least 5 people through organ donation. He was also a health nut, always had Costco sized bottles of vitamins and exercised often. Dallas was a good person. He was funny, kind, generous nearly to a fault, a great cook, loved his family, dearly loved his children, was a great friend, meticulous when it came to work, strived to be a better person and loved cats. He will be missed greatly by our entire family.

Dallas's cat, Chateau. He rescued her after mom disappeared. He bottled fed her until she could eat on her own. She seems to know when I'm especially sad about Dallas.

Dallas's other cat, Chianti. He's a lover and offers many, many cuddles.

So, as I began this short piece, this year is about endings and beginnings. Loose ends are currently being tied up whether we are ready for them to be or not. I had a quote that hung on my wall as a kiddo that I reflect on often; “When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.” ― Helen Keller

I know that this doesn't mean don't feel the grief but a reminder to not miss out on the happiness that life has to offer. I've gone through an incredible transformation, and this is a small piece of it. I love you, Dallas.

Dallas and I visiting for the holidays in 2018