Wow…so glad I don’t have an older brother. Still, it really bites how my younger brothers have literally no respect for me at all because I don’t like rap and skateboarding. I don’t bully them, I don’t talk down on them (any more than they talk down on me at least), but just because I’m the oldest they attribute bad qualities to me that I do not possess. Because I could assert myself (to put it lightly), automatically they lash out with whatever defenses they can whenever I do something they don’t approve of, which usually means I take a lot of verbal abuse and jibes whenever possible, along with pranks and smart aleck responses whenever I ask them to do something. Let me tell you, it weighs more heavily on my self-esteem then I think they understand.
Example: Last Friday I slept over at a friends house. We had fun and stayed up 'till around 2 in the morning, and I got tired first. So I go in a separate room for some peace and quiet (because my brother and friend wanted to stay up longer), and try to get some sleep. In a couple of minutes, my oldest brother (who’s 15, for Pete’s sake) decides it’d be funny to spray air freshener all in the room around me. Let me make it straight that I HATE the smell of air freshener, and he knew that full and well. What he didn’t know was that at the time, I was still awake, and had my face directly towards a fan blowing at the highest setting on me, so when he came in I had my eyes open (but it was too dark for him to tell). A little bit of it got in my eyes, and I was unable to sleep due to the stinging sensation caused by the stuff. Eventually I washed out my eyes and went back to bed without him noticing, and just decided to let it go like I always do.
The best part is that we went swimming the next day, and he told me about his “funny” little prank while I was sleeping. I swear, he was lucky we were in a public place with security cameras (Huh, I just now realized that is somewhat creepy…cameras at a pool? I’m not lying though). We got home soon, and he even had the bravado to tell Mom about it too (I’m honest, I would have just let it go. This is the third time this kind of thing has happened, and when I told the first time, his “punishment” was the deletion of his Facebook account that has since been recovered for the third time (My parents really know nothing about computers. Or the internet)). So what does she have to say about it? She comes to me and says “Paul, you really need to get him back for that.” And then she suggested some random prank that I decided against, but it doesn’t matter, because she was within earshot of my brother, and I think her real intention was to scare him out of doing it again, but it just loses me more points with my younger brothers. Especially if he thinks I’ll actually carry out whatever it was she suggested.
It seems like there is no way for me to genuinely mend the relationships with my brothers. Although they hardly acknowledge it, I absolutely love every single one of them equally and indiscriminately, and there seems to be no way to get them to understand that. Especially since I turned 17, I’ve started to look into the future of my life and where I want to take it, because college is on my doorstep. I’ve been forced by life to reevaluate myself, and to be honest, I don’t like the way I relate to my family that much. I feel like I’ve caused my parents far too much grief then they deserve, and I get chills when I think of growing up, having a family, and still having a rivalry between my brothers. I will never hold a grudge, and I hope that whenever they decide to grow up, they won’t either.
So I guess that concludes my rant for today. the purpose of this was to console myself that I’ve done my absolute best on this matter, which I think I have. I’ve probably exaggerated a lot, but oh well. I hope expressing my views have given you some insight on what it is like to be the oldest brother of 6, although I find the thought of throwing my brother to some bees to be completely barbaric (I even have a minor phobia of bees). If your brother is who I now see him as (I also hate overconfident jocks), you have my sympathy.
