REBECCA LAMPERT: I make a scrapbook full of pictures of my soldier sons, proof that they knew each other just in case somebody doesn't make it home.

ANNA CONATHAN: He emailed me back quite quickly, and I had to read the paragraph twice before I realized I had another brother.

JOSEPH COLLYMORE SMALL: We got together the following morning, and we had the most enlightening conversation as siblings in years.

THERESA OKOKON: Tonight's theme is "Siblings."

♪ ♪ Siblings share a lot of things, like their last name maybe, their family members, a living space.

But there's a lot that siblings don't share.

Even identical twins have independent identities.

Now, tonight's storytellers are going to be sharing their stories of growing together with their siblings, through good times and bad times and through times that are downright remarkable.

♪ ♪ LAMPERT: I'm Rebecca Lampert.

I have lived in Massachusetts my whole life.

I have five children.

I am a lover of words, and my friends every once in a while will tell me that I have a, a knack for telling a story and keeping people kind of on edge.

So let's talk a little bit about this power of words and the love of words.

Was it a challenge for you to find the right words for the story that you're sharing tonight?

Oh, yes, I found that, I almost feel like every single word means something.

Mmm.

Never mind the reason why I'm doing it.

To give people a glimpse of one family's um, experience with boys away, or children away at war, But trying to get it to where it needed to be, I felt like I was writing poetry.

Every word, every syllable had to have a purpose, and that's been quite a challenge.

♪ ♪ I'm standing in a funeral home in eastern Massachusetts, looking at a flag-draped casket.

It is flanked by two in military uniform standing sentry.

I find comfort in the knowledge that no fallen soldier is ever left unattended.

From the battlefield, transport home, to the grave with taps.

It's early 2000s, and I have two sons that are deployed to Iraq at the same time, and then one again to Afghanistan.

When I attend the wakes and funerals of other mothers' children, it is heart-wrenching every time.

But it is my duty to be present.

I am a military mom, a Blue Star mother.

This is why we join a neighborhood church, because if my family needs to bury a son, we will do it with people who know our names.

That is my first coping mechanism.

Be prepared.

While we certainly have veterans in our family tree, I never expected these two sons to take that route.

The oldest son ignored everyone's rules but was loyal to his friends and his music.

He was just looking for some direction after high school.

The younger son had the smarts but made foolish choices.

He was looking for escape from teen temptation.

When your son or daughter decides to join military service, you might as well raise your pledging hand, too, because like it or not, you are part of that world now.

Our family went into survival mode, just like my soldiers, only we did it without proper training.

For over two years, I tried to keep family life as normal as possible.

Get up, get dressed, get people off to work and school, chores, errands, homework, dinner, bed, repeat.

I wore waterproof mascara and learned how to cry without anybody noticing.

When the doorbell rang, I stopped breathing.

And I figured out how to see the front door from a side window, hoping never to greet two casualty officers.

Usually, a really easygoing, patient, and social person, I was barely functioning, with numb detachment or electrified fear.

The voice in my head was screaming, "Who cares about everything beyond our military-saturated bubble?"

Friends tell me I had no light in me unless I was doing something in support of my soldiers, but I don't really remember those years.

I have pictures to prove they happened and that I was there.

Call it amnesia, PTSD.

I call it "lost in the dark."

How do I survive two sons away at war?

Well, I learn how to instant message, and then I sit up all night long, staring at the screen on the computer, just waiting to see if one of them signs on.

And then I know, at that moment, he's alive.

I make a scrapbook full of pictures of my soldier sons with their other siblings, proof that they knew each other just in case somebody doesn't make it home.

I fill care packages for my soldiers, their battle buddies, their team leaders, and the two or three soldiers who never get mail.

One day, I've somehow dragged in nine or ten boxes into the local post office, and I'm standing at the counter, filling out and affixing my labels when my tape runs out.

Well, I am so overwhelmed and emotionally raw that I totally lose it.

I am crying, dropping supplies, knocking over boxes until I have to, unapologetically, walk over to the customer service window and interrupt for some help.

Well, I have been here so often that they come right out with one of those, like, industrial-size tape dispensers and proceed to wrap up the remaining boxes for shipping.

And he pulls me together, too.

On Sundays, I go to church to pray for my sons' safety, at the very risk of missing their phone calls.

The younger one never does, but the older one leaves messages.

He'll wish us a happy whatever the next holiday is because he only has a small window every, like, once or twice a month.

He uses phrases like, "Everything's cool, I'm good."

(laughter) And I know that in no way in Iraq is that true.

He needs to believe it, and I desperately want to.

And then it's Mother's Day, and the older one doesn't call, but the younger one catches me at home.

I am so overjoyed at the sweetness of this connection, until he tells me how it almost didn't happen.

The story goes that he was in the water trailer taking a shower, and he heard incoming mortars.

He jumped into his boots, grabbed his clothes, his firearm, and ran like hell for safety when he heard the shell hit.

Well, it was close enough that as he looked back over his shoulder, he could see that shower trailer toppled over and in shambles.

His story is punctuated with quite a few swear words and delivered with breathless excitement and a lot of nervous laughter.

I am so grateful he cannot see the look of horror on my face, But I know that he is still processing that near miss, so I say, "Did you rinse off all your soap?"

(laughter) Not the Mother's Day gift I ever wanted, but one I will never forget.

The months march on with more missed calls and fearful tears.

And then, thankfully, the deployment ends.

From a sea of returning soldiers, I find mine.

I send the children ahead with welcome home hugs.

My husband greets them with a handshake and a shoulder squeeze.

I myself cannot get too close because I know I will collapse with relief.

Upon coming home, my younger son needs to sit with his back against the wall so he can have full view of his surroundings just to feel safe.

My older son shares stories in the dead of the night he will never repeat again.

They bring home a bond more than brothers.

While I don't really remember much about those two years, I do remember how we survived and how we all changed.

And with my boys home, I know what it feels like to be whole again.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) ♪ ♪ SMALL: My name is Joseph Collymore Small.

I grew up in Duxbury, Massachusetts.

I'm the oldest of six, and actually, I'm also the oldest of 60-- six-oh-- old grandchildren.

You see, my mom was one of 15.

Whoo, that's a big family!

Quite tribal, yeah.

(Okokon laughs) So when did you first discover that you had a gift for storytelling?

Well, first off, I'm not sure that I have a gift for storytelling, insofar as I'm still learning this craft.

However, growing up in a very large family, when you have many relatives, aunts, uncles, grandparents, great-aunts, great-uncles, and they're all sitting around the table, usually around the big holidays, invariably, somebody is telling a story.

And I would listen intently to how they were telling their story.

When you think about tonight's theme, what does it mean to you?

SMALL: It means a lot.

This is going to be a very emotional storytelling for me.

OKOKON: Mm-hmm.

Uh, it's about one of my siblings who's gravely ill.

But I want this story to be not only heartfelt, but that it conveys a sense of strength and faith... Mm-hmm.

That you get when families are tested.

Some families fall apart, other families come together, and they're stronger.

And I feel and believe that our family is stronger.

♪ ♪ I received an urgent text message requesting an immediate family meeting of siblings.

Not sure what was happening, I waited for my five siblings to respond and confirm their availability, but only four out of five responded.

Immediately, I thought it was my brother Kurtis, because he's always M.I.A.

But no, it was my brother Craig, who was noticeably absent.

And then I thought, well, you know, typical Craig.

He always makes his grand entrance at the last minute.

I mean, you know, he's 6'4 ”, he has that Hollywood-esque look, and he walks into the room and sucks all the air out of the room.

(laughter) But my sister Tracey, the doctor, gravely announces over the phone that our Craig has stage four pancreatic cancer.

It was deafening silence.

And as I'm trying to comprehend stage four pancreatic cancer, I hear sobs slowly rising on the phone that got louder, and louder, and louder until they were cries.

And it was my brother Lance.

You see, Lance is 11 months younger than Craig.

They're Irish twins, they were very close.

And as I'm trying to control these emotions that were going on inside of me, trying to fix the pain that my siblings were expressing on this call, I realized I couldn't.

I realized that for the first time in my life, suddenly those four words brought hard and cold the reality that I can't fix this.

What then went on to follow was cacophony of questions Who, how, when?

How long do we have with him?

Shortly thereafter, our sister Sharna, the organizer, immediately started putting together a calendar where we, as siblings and extended family members, could visit and be caregivers for Craig, especially during those times when he's undergoing the chemo treatment.

Adding to the stress was the fact that our brother Craig lived alone in a one bedroom condo in Atlanta, Georgia.

And so on my first visit I realized he didn't have a sleep sofa, so I had to sleep on an air mattress.

I mean, what's a geezer like me, approaching 70, having to spend a couple of weeks on an air mattress?

I mean, come on now.

(laughter) And then on a second visit, I'm doing his laundry, and he has the nerve to try to tell me how to fold a fitted sheet.

I mean, really.

(laughter) And on the third visit, I'm sort of taking in and surveying his home.

And I started to realize that there were some very interesting things there there that I hadn't realized that he was keeping.

Like there's a horse saddle over in the corner, bull horns on the wall, cedar logs by the wood-burning fireplace, a cowboy hat over in the corner.

And at that point, I realized my brother is a cowboy.

(laughter) A Black cowboy, a buffalo soldier, if you will.

You see, we grew up with horses and he never forgot his roots.

But what I also noticed as I looked across the room at his dining room table, there were some fresh cut flowers in this crystal vase.

And so I looked over at him and I said, "So, who's the lady that got you the flowers?"

And he looks back at me in a very... simple way and says, "I like to buy myself flowers."

And at that moment, I realize that my brother is truly a sensitive person that I had long forgotten Being there as his caregiver, the days turned into weeks.

Pills, medication all over the place, confusing and overwhelming me.

And I felt that I was struggling.

trying to keep weight on him as he grew weaker and weaker.

And I felt, literally, my brother is dying right before me... and I didn't know how to fix that.

And it came to a point where I had to say, "Help me be a better caregiver, help me care for you."

But not before I put these sticky notes all over his bathroom mirror.

"One day at a time."

"God ain't finished with you yet."

"Easy does it."

And... "Be a better patient, damn it."

(laughter) Why?

Because he complained constantly and incessantly about my cooking.

He was losing his sense of taste, and his smell wasn't too far behind.

My roasted chicken didn't have enough salt.

And, well, my cedar plank salmon?

Well, that was dead on arrival.

But we got together the following morning and we shared a cup of coffee and an English muffin, and we had the most enlightening conversation as siblings in years.

Like, who does cook the best among us siblings?

Who gets him up off the sofa, outside, fresh air, driving his vintage Jeep CJ-5, driving it like he stole it?

And who sent him the better weed?

(laughter) I mean, you see, his kitchen cabinet was full of every conceivable cannabis product as you can imagine.

Tinctures, tea bags, edibles, gummies, even good old roll joints, all sent by siblings and family members to help smooth out the effects of the chemo and to try to keep his appetite up.

After six months, Craig has decided to stop chemo and concentrate on quality as opposed to quantity.

And you know what?

He's at peace with that.

And what I reflect back from that first night, that telephone call when I realized I couldn't control, I couldn't fix, What I've come to learn and appreciate is that we as siblings... (exhales) came together, working as a team, even Craig himself, pulling himself up by the bootstraps and helping us help him take care of our cowboy.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) ♪ ♪ CONATHAN: My name is Anna Conathan.

I live in South Portland, Maine, with my husband, who works in ocean policy, and my son, who is a D&D-obsessed theater kid.

And I am a writer, I'm a coach, and I also lobster on a boat in the summer as a sternman.

You're a lobsterer?

- Yes.

Tell me more about that.

Why do you do it?

What do you like about it?

What's hard?

My background was in film and writing and acting.

And when I had my son, I had to give up my screenwriting career because it was just really hard to do both simultaneously well.

And the last script I'd been working on was one where I was researching lobstering for a romantic comedy I was writing.

And so I went on a bunch of lobster boats, and I discovered that I actually like working on a lobster boat more than I like writing.

So what kind of stories do you most enjoy telling?

As I was growing up, the people that really lit my fire were people like Mark Twain or David Sedaris, or Eve Ensler, Anne Lamott.

People who could take the pain of life and also the humor of life and mix it together.

Mm-hmm.

I have incredible access to my feelings and emotions, which sometimes scares people.

And humor is a way of saying, "I am okay," but also it's a way of demonstrating to people that it's okay to feel your feelings and that we're all going to survive.

♪ ♪ Storyland is a quaint little theme park based on fairy tale stories in Glen, New Hampshire.

As the sign out front says, "Where fantasy lives."

(audience laughs) Only open in the summers, it is a hot spot for families on vacation, and my family was no exception.

And we held these memories as very special, until one day, our father, at 60 years old, met his Cinderella there-- a 21-year-old Russian girl who was a theme park worker for the summer, and he named her "his destiny," even though her name was actually Masha.

(laughter) He left my mother after 36 years of marriage.

He left my siblings and I.

He left America.

And it was mind-blowing for my siblings and I, because who my father had always been was this Catholic patriarch, king of his castle, and we were his loyal subjects who did his bidding.

There were some very clear expectations about who we were supposed to be.

We were to be good, we were to reflect positively upon our family, and we were to follow his rules.

So when my father met his destiny at Storyland and decided to break all of his own rules-- cheating, lying, you know, abandoning his commitments, leaving all respectable behavior behind and jetting off to Europe-- our minds were blown.

(exhales sharply) For me, it was like someone had taken a grapefruit spoon and just scooped through the ventricles of my heart.

I cycled through a hurricane of feelings-- confusion, betrayal, sadness, anger.

My friends who had divorced parents said to me, "Make sure you tell your father how you feel."

(laughs) I did.

I really, really did.

(laughter) Everything I had ever wanted to say to my father as a child but was too scared for fear of retribution-- every pain, every rejection, every, every piece of anger that lived inside of me came flying out like a holy fire and just scorched the man where he stood.

He was silent.

That never happened.

And then he was silent for many months after that, because I pretty much destroyed our relationship.

But what came out of this experience was that I realized I was liberated.

This strong foundation that he had built was no longer mine to follow.

If he didn't have to follow it, I didn't have to follow it.

And so what I saw from the ashes of this whole situation was a possibility.

And I particularly saw possibilities with Robin and David because, we never felt close because we were so busy reflecting to my father and trying to be who he wanted us to be.

And so I, as the emotional member of the family, thought, "This is a great opportunity for all of us."

And so I went to my, my mother and my siblings, and I was like, "Let's let the healing begin.

"It is time to do a cleanse of tyranny and figure out what we can create as a family."

And they were like, "No."

(laughter) "Nope, we don't want to talk about it."

They just wanted to back off into their own corners, privately, and process.

And the more I pushed, the more I prodded, the more they retreated into their healing corners.

Now, I didn't talk to my father again for a long, long time.

And periodically, he would reach out and make strange connections.

Like, "Did you know this fun fact about Europe?"

Or, "Guess who died?"

Does your father ever play that game with you?

"Guess who died?"

Yeah.

And so I was just like, "No."

I, I kept him at bay.

And then finally my mother said to me, "Look, I think it's time for the healing to begin, and I think you need to start with your father."

So this is five years after he left.

I wrote him an email, and I said, "Look, I think I'm ready to try "having a relationship with you again.

Here's what's going on in my life."

He emailed me back quite quickly and started telling me about a person that I didn't know, a young boy, who had been born sick, but was now a vibrant four-year-old who loved skiing and football.

His name was Nicholas, and he had the same last name I had.

And I had to read the paragraph twice before I realized...

I had another brother, a secret brother.

And then at the bottom of the email, he said, "Don't worry, I'll forward this on to Robin and David."

Immediately, like, my sibling alarm went off, and I pivoted quickly into protection mode.

I called my sister, and I said, "Robin, Robin, don't open Dad's email."

And she said, "I, I already know.

I've known for years."

So then I called my brother, and David answered and I said, "Don't open Dad's email."

And he said, "I know, I've known for a while."

And I said, "How long?"

And he said, "Six months."

I said "How?"

And he said, "Well, I you know, was Skyping with Dad, "and Nicholas walked through frame, "and 'I was like, who's that cute little guy?'

And my dad was like, 'Funny story.'"

(laughter) And I felt so... abandoned again.

You know, that my two siblings would keep this from me.

And I said, "Why, why didn't you tell me?"

And they said, "Dad told us not to."

And I was angry, livid, betrayed.

And then it occurred to me, I don't think we have to do this his way.

So I called my brother and my sister, and I said, "I love you.

"I love you so much.

"And I'm so sorry this is happening, "but we need to pull together, "because the man who's writing our narrative "left the castle, "and it's our turn to create something different.

"I want to be close to you.

"I want to be able to do this without his say.

"Call me, talk to me, "tell me what's going on.

"Don't let someone who's not even here decide our future."

That conversation changed everything with my siblings.

Right now, I am closer with my siblings than I have ever been... except for one.

I have a brother, who is now about eleven years old, and he lives across the ocean in Europe.

And someday, he may come knocking on my door, and when he does, it's going to be open.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) THERESA OKOKON: The Stories from the Stage podcast, with extraordinary true stories, wherever you listen to podcasts.

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