The Rooftop
I sat down hard on the grey asphalt shingles. I loosened the five cent brass nut from the plastic tube that ran from the faucet to the evaporative cooler and memories I didn’t want swamped me. It took me to places that I wasn’t ready to go.
Six months before, the winter had been melting away and the sunshine of early spring was starting to remind everyone that summer was around the corner. My little brother had called and asked if I could take the afternoon and come help set up his swamp cooler.
“Ryan, I’m slammed. I’ve got homework coming out of my ears, and I have to work all weekend.” Feeling a little ashamed of myself I hurried to add, “Besides, I showed you how to set it up and take it down last year. It’s a one man job.”
“Yeah, I know.” he replied, “But if you can show me one more time, I think I’ll have it figured out.”
“Alright, once more. But dude, this ain’t that hard.”
And it wasn’t. We had spent the afternoon sitting on the roof, drinking Big Gulps and talking about football, money, the family, and his new job moving trailers at a trucking dock. It wasn’t a bad way to spend an afternoon.
When the birch pads were pinned to the wall panels and the filter basket was set under the pump we were ready to go. All that was left was to connect the plastic water supply tube to the float valve. Somehow or other, I had not noticed that the brass nut was missing from the end of the tube.
“Damn”, I said to Ryan. “We’re gonna have to go to the hardware store.”
If we hadn’t been having such a good time shooting the breeze, I would have been irritated. As the day had worn on, though, the job was less and less about the work and more about just spending some time together.
I liked talking with Ryan. At 23 he was a husband, father of two kids, and now three inches taller than me. He thought this meant he could take me apart in a wrestling match and I would occasionally be required to remind him he was wrong. More than once I told him that no matter how big he got, I’d always be older, wiser and able to beat his butt. The 10 years difference in our ages seemed like a big disparity when we were young, but the older we got the less it mattered.
When he was little, Ryan hated being youngest. He would follow Tim, Kevin and me, his older brothers, everywhere we went. We used to say Ryan was 8 going on 18. If we did something, he wanted to do it too. As bad as it bugged him to be youngest, I think he liked having three older brothers he could go to for advice.
We got down off the roof and left for the hardware store. It took twenty seconds to find the nickel-a-piece fittings and we got in line to pay.
“We drive three miles and use ten dollars worth of gasoline to buy a five cent chunk of brass” he complained. “What a waste.”
I just laughed at him.
“Beats living in an oven.” I said.
On the way back to his house he pointed out a little two story home at the end of a side street in his neighborhood.
“You remember that cop that got killed by the drug dealer last month?” Ryan asked me. “That’s where he lived.”
“I remember,” I said. “Did you know him?”
“Naw, but he left a wife and three little kids behind. They ought to stick that dirt bag in the electric chair and forget to shut the power off.”
“I’ll turn it on.” I said. “But it’ll take forty years before it happens. There isn’t a lot of justice left. The whole planet is headed to Hell in a FedEx envelope.”
We got to his house and climbed back up to the roof top.
“You got an old piece of hose to hook up to the drain?” I asked. “If not, that thing is gonna drip on your shingles all summer long and it’ll destroy your roof.”
“No,” he said. “I guess I’ll have to go back to the store again. But I’m not doing it now.”
“Just don’t forget it, or you’ll be sorry.” I warned him. “That little drip will cave in the whole roof faster than you can believe. Now let’s tighten this nut up, and then I gotta get home.”
“Thanks, bro,” he said. “I owe you a dinner.”
“Don’t worry about it. Just don’t forget the drain hose. And Ryan….”
“Yeah?”
“When Fall comes; take this thing down yourself. You’re a big boy now.”
“Hey Pat….”
“What?”
“Shut up”
And now, six months later, it was fall and here I was sitting on Ryan’s roof, holding that same stupid brass nut and taking his swamp cooler down by myself.
He’d been gone a month now, crushed one afternoon between the cab of his truck and the trailer he was moving. He had gotten out to hook up the lines, and the brake had slipped, or had not been set properly, or whatever. It didn’t matter. The inspectors didn’t know, and I didn’t care.
Ryan was gone and this piece of brass was still here and the whole thing seemed stupid and unjust. The fitting wasn’t worth spit; it cost a nickel. My brother was a husband and a father and someone with infinite worth and endless possibilities for where his life could go. The fitting was here… and my brother was not.
I thought of the cop we had talked about on the way home that day. He was gone too and a drug dealer who was worth less than my brass fitting was still breathing. It made no sense. It was impossible to understand and mind crushingly frustrating to come to terms with.
Two good men were dead for trying to do their jobs. One man I never met and the other I loved with all my heart, but both were gone. The promise of their lives was cut painfully short. Was this justice? They had left widows and children to pick up the shattered pieces of their hearts and try to live normal lives, only without the blessings of a Daddy.
It made me furious.
I knew in my heart that there was order to the universe. Deep inside I knew that there were lessons to be learned from my brother’s death. I believed with all my heart in the Truth of the eternal family. But here on this rooftop, doing the one last thing that I could do for my brother in this life; I was too hurt and too angry to care.
I had always believed that God sent trials to help us learn. But this? What could I learn from losing a brother? All I was learning was that I could do my best to help others and live a good life and likely still be miserable. Life seemed to end so arbitrarily. You’re hooking up a truck at work, pulling over a speeding car, or maybe eating a sandwich, for crying out loud. And the next thing you know, your kids are fatherless.
From the day he died up to now, I had been broken hearted and going through the grieving process. As I looked down at the brass hose connector, I was officially ticked. Way too ticked for lessons.
My whole body felt drained of energy and I slumped down next to the cooler. I was so…lost. I couldn’t think, couldn’t act, couldn’t move.
So I prayed.
“No more, Father. It’s too much. I don’t need or want any more lessons on misery. I need mercy. I need to feel peace.”
Choking down the lump in my throat, I continued. “I thought you said ‘Men are that they might have joy.’ I haven’t felt joy in weeks. But hey, if joy is too much to ask, how about just turning off the pain for a while? What do I have to do? How do I feel OK about this? Tell me, and I’ll do it”
I didn’t bother closing the prayer. I was emotionally wrung out and even as short a prayer as that one had required more faith and spiritual energy than I thought I had. I rested my head against the side of the cooler and drifted off to sleep.
I woke with a start, it was nearly sundown. I jumped up and hurried to finish wrapping the cooler in plastic wrap to keep out the winter wind and dust. I felt dizzy and suddenly lost my balance.
Startled again, I found myself in a comfortable room. It was big; about the size of a hotel ballroom. Everything was white. The carpets, walls and furniture were all brilliant, gleaming, white; without a hint of dirt or tarnish. The only thing in the room that was not white was the stained glass windows which portrayed huge blue waterfalls, dense green forests, and dusty red deserts. The color of the glass was rich and full and viewed in harmony with the pure white walls and furnishings, it was breathtaking.
Light streamed in through the glass keeping a radiant glow in the room but oddly remaining pure and untinted by the colors of the window art. It was quiet but not uncomfortably so, and there was a faint scent of lilacs in the air. I was sitting at ease on an overstuffed sofa. A flash of insight struck me and I knew where I must be, and what must have happened.
“Oh, damn!” I whispered without thinking.
“Dude, I hope you lived really well, because half your Final Judgment is based on how you react when you find yourself here.”
“Really?” I gasped. I fervently hoped that I hadn’t just messed up bad.
Ryan sat down next to me on the sofa and laughed. He was dressed from head to toe in white that shone as brightly as everything else that I had seen.
“Naw, take it easy bro, I’m just messin’ with you.”
Relieved, I was about to hit him when reality hit me again instead.
“So I suppose this means I’m……”
“No,” said my little brother, shaking his head gently. “At least not the way you think. But you are rotting away inside, and that’s actually worse. So I need to show you something.
We were back on the rooftop, standing next to the cooler.
“This place has a great view. The lake, the mountains, the whole valley.” Ryan said. “Someone lives here their whole life; it’s hard for them to notice the beauty.”
“True,” I said. “I didn’t know I lived in a desert until I spent two years on an island. Couldn’t believe how dry everything looked when I came back. I missed the mountains. So I get what you mean.”
“Do me a favor, Bro” he asked.
“Anything you want, Ryan.”
“Show me where your house is.”
“Can’t. It’s like twenty five miles away; there are trees, buildings, a mountain; all kinds of stuff between here and there. You know that.”
“But you know where it is, don’t you? You know how to get there from here, right?”
“Yeah.”
“If I took your car away and you had to walk home from here, how long would it take?” he asked.
“Probably all day.” I replied
“And what if you rode a horse?”
“I dunno; a couple of hours maybe.”
“And how long will it take to get in your car and drive?” he asked.
“Ten minutes, tops. Why?”
Ryan put his hand on my shoulder, and we found ourselves standing on the roof of my house. All I could do was whistle low and quiet.
“Nice trick, bro.”
“Did you think it was possible to go from my house to yours in the blink of an eye?” Ryan asked me.
“Not like that.” I had to admit.
“Does the space between my house and yours seem less when we move this way?”
“Sure.”
“Well, big brother, what you have to learn is that Distance, Time, Life; all those words help our finite minds grasp infinite Truth. They give us what is known as perspective. Mortal man cannot comprehend Eternal Truth as a whole, as it really is, so we try to break it up; measure it, quantify it, that sort of thing. The measurements give you perspective.”
Intelligently as I could, I asked “Huh?”
For some reason he laughed at me again.
“Think of a caveman. To him, the distance between our houses is huge. It takes all day to travel from one to another. He would see that distance as too far to go for any but the most important reasons. He is incapable of comprehending the distance as anything but insurmountable.
But if we showed him a car, and how it works, he would be as stunned and illuminated by that miracle as you were when I moved us just now. Suddenly, the distance is seen by him as much less significant. It is no longer an obstacle and he will start to travel it more frequently, and for less necessity. He eventually becomes comfortable with what he has learned.”
“As man progresses in intelligence and ability, he gains perspective, just like the caveman. The distance between our houses remains the same. It never changes. It is what it is; a Truth. But our understanding of that Truth, how to measure it, describe it to others, and the perception of the obstacles it presents for us; that changes a lot. Perspective allows for possibilities we would never before have dreamt of.”
“That makes sense” I said.
“Of course it does. What, you figure I was just showing off?” he asked with a sly smirk.
“I brought you here because if you don’t learn to change your perspective, you’ll spend the rest of your life asking pointless questions like ‘What if?’ and ‘Why me?’, and you’ll never get anywhere.”
“Bro,” he said, “to your mind, 80 years is forever. You’re like the caveman starting the long walk over that nearly insurmountable twenty five miles. It seems like an eternity. You don’t think you’ll ever get there. And what I am telling you is that your life isn’t nearly as long and unhappy as you perceive it to be right now. Quit feeling sorry for yourself, because I’m fine. You knew that before, but now you have seen for yourself. I see things differently now, and someday you will too. Quit worrying and savor those moments when you get to glimpse Truth as it is.”
I managed a barely perceptible nod as he continued.
“Let me give you an example”, he said. “You know that ‘Men are that they might have joy’. OK, shift your emphasis a little and change your perspective. ‘Men are that they MIGHT have joy.’ Joy doesn’t just fall into your lap, bro. You have to choose to be happy. Remember that the scripture doesn’t say anything about not having misery too. You can’t have sweet without the bitter. It’s another Truth that cannot be changed.”
“Lastly, don’t ever forget that ‘your trials will be but for a small moment, and will give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.’ The Lord said that too, and he hasn’t changed his mind.”
“Alright,” I said. “You are making an awful lot of sense. I don’t remember you being all that philosophical before, though.”
“Things change” he grinned.
A moment passed and I asked, “How’s Grandpa?”
“Never better” Ryan answered. He looks in on you guys all the time. He’s proud of all of you. But you didn’t need me to tell you that did you?”
“Naw, I guess not.”
Another minute passed in silence, and then Ryan put his hand back on my shoulder.
“Bro…”
“Yeah, Ryan?”
“Thanks for taking down the cooler. I still owe you dinner.”
“I can’t wait to collect. I love you, man.”
“I love you too. Keep an eye on my family, and hug Mom, will ya?”
“No sweat”
I woke up, my face sore where it had rested against the swamp cooler. I noticed that Ryan never had gotten a drain hose. With the house for sale, it didn’t seem to matter anymore. I picked up the plastic wrap and as carefully as I had ever done anything in my life, I slowly wrapped the cooler.
I was happy beyond measure for the afternoon I had shared with my brother six months before. It was now a memory of priceless worth. I saw the roof of the house down the street where the cop had lived and I prayed that his family had the same kind of peace I suddenly felt blessed with.
I looked down at the five cent brass fittings connecting both sides of the water tube and snipped them both off with my pocket knife. They suddenly seemed priceless too. I put them in my pocket to remind me to keep my perspective as clear as it was right then.
Maybe later, I’d put one under Ryan’s headstone, like a promise.
I finished strapping the cover over the cooler and slowly looked across the valley to where my house and family waited for me in the distance. I knew it was there, but I still couldn’t see it.
Ten minutes later, I was home.
