My Big Brother, Keith

I had the best big brother in the world, and I idolized him.  Keith was a year and a half older than me.  With his dark brown, almost black hair, contagious smile, and twinkling blue eyes he was a miniature copy of dad, and he was so cute!  Best of all, he liked me.

One morning when I was just a baby mom gave Keith a bunch of grapes.  He loved grapes and he loved me, and he figured he ought to share.  Mom came into the bedroom just in time to see Keith leaning into my bassinet, stuffing another grape into my mouth.  My face was turning blue from lack of oxygen, but poor Keith couldn't understand why mama wouldn't let him share his grapes.

We had shiny, hard wood floors in our house, perfect for sliding on.  After mom would dust mop the hall she would put thick socks on us so we could run and slide all the way from the front room to the bedrooms.  One day Keith got a sliver from the floors.  Mama had to take tweezers to get it out, and it stung!  Keith howled and pulled his hand away, making it almost impossible to remove the sliver.  He screamed even louder when mom tried to brush some iodine on the hurt. 

"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!" Keith cried as he danced around, shaking his poor little finger. 

"I bet if you did an Indian dance it would make you feel better," mama suggested, giving up on the iodine.  Keith's face lit up light a penny.  He loved playing cowboys and Indians, and he did a really good war dance impression.

"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!"  he yelled, as he danced on first one foot and then the other, patting his hand over his mouth just like the Indians on TV.  "Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!   Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!"  Funny how doing an Indian dance could make the hurt go away.

On Christmas Santa Clause brought Keith a shiny new rocking horse and a cowboy hat and cowboy jacket. He looked just like Roy Rogers or the Lone Ranger when he climbed onto his pony and started to ride.  He knew what to do, too.  Whipping his hat off his head, Keith waved it in the air and shouted, "High Ho Sliver Man Away!"  Mom and Dad broke into a fit of laughter, but I thought Keith was the coolest looking cowboy in the world!