Around the time of my brothers second surgery his employer had informed me that she would be closing down his one man office that was located in our bucolic little downtown and that she would like to meet with me to get a key to the office.

I agreed to meet with her and mentally prepared myself to meet with a female version of my previous employer of Bootcamp & Co. We met at the tiny sticky-tabled cafe that was below my brothers office and sat down to have an awkward talk and a weak but needed on my part cup of coffee.

We surveyed each other (I could tell she had never met a woman like me) and after I had sucked down the coffee I was ready to get this shit over with and said “let’s head upstairs”. Since she had ordered nothing I took out my meager rations to pay for my coffee.. I kinda hoped under some shred of decency for my brothers 32 years of service (and that she was dealing with a woman in crisis) she would pay for my coffee out of kindness.. but she didn’t and I paid for the coffee and left Maria our waitress the appropriate tip.

We got upstairs and she took all that she needed out of my brothers bare-as-bones office. I mean the guy had a folding table for a computer desk, a computer that my other brother had cobbled together for him and crappy 20-year-old press-board furniture that had seen better days. The only new thing in the rinky-dink office of any worth was the fax machine.

She told me that she wanted to have the office cleaned out by a certain day and I said ok. I made plans to go back to the office that Friday and I get everything that was my brothers.

I was surprised when I got a call from his employer telling me that she went back that my brothers office that day and decided that she was also going to take his computer with her.

I was LIVID as it was not even hers to take. The files yes, the hardware, no. She had not purchased it . My other brother had put it together for my brother and the only thing she owned in it was the memory cards that my brother had to beg her to pay for. However, both my Father, Mother and my other brother told me that this was a battle that was not worth fighting. Let her have the computer Susie they told me. Put down your sword… there are better fights to fight.

I had to let it go. Oh how I wanted to take out my sword and start swinging away much like my love Gerard Butler did in the movie “300” but NO.. I was not granted such serene pleasure.

She had come down and done what she set after to do. Take all the things needed to run the business and go back up north to her life.

So, with a hardened heart I went on that Friday and I took every little thing that was my brothers and I left everything that wasnt. I felt so sad doing what I did. I loved my brother very much and knowing that I was closing down perhaps the one thing he COULD control in his life, his part in a business, well, it damn near killed me.

In the back of my head all I could think of was “how am I gonna tell my brother the office is gone”

My brother at this point was progressing well in the eyes of the hospital. He had woken up from his second surgery and one day, the week before Thanksgiving, I came to visit him on the 9th floor lo and behold I found he was transferred down to the 6 Floor of the hospital where those who are recovering from Surgery go.

I felt kinda lucky. I now got to have a different colored pass to clutch as I rode up the elevator…..