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You would've turned 40 September 25.  The round numbers seem harder for some reason.  I think we all search for significance in some ways.  Round numbers seem to be an easy thing to hang a hat on. I saw a funny meme the other day.  Apparently, Kanye got saved.  I know.  It was a meme of Bill Gaither doing a Homecoming concert with Kanye.  I'd almost go watch it.  Almost. I know that you would have sent it to me with the cry laugh emoji.

 Every now and then it still pops up when I'm not expecting it.  I think about you every day.  I was watching a documentary called Country Music on PBS a few weeks back, actually some time around your birthday.  And Vince Gill started talking about writing Go Rest Hight on That Mountain for Keith Whitley when he died.  He said that he couldn't get through the first verse of writing it because it tore him up.  Then his brother died.  I couldn't get through the story.  The assurance that I have that you are in Heaven right now is really the only thing that has kept me from falling apart. My knowledge of God's grace and faithfulness has sustained on many days when I wanted to retreat into the deep recesses of my mind. The questions that are unanswered are still asked.  They're still hard to think about.  The complexity of all of this is very difficult to navigate sometimes.

The people that are reading this might find this next little stanza of text to be difficult to understand.   I think you would get a little bit of a kick out of the number of awkward conversations I've had to have over the last three years about you not being here anymore.  I know one of the greatest joys in your life was to put me in positions that made me squirm a little bit.  One doesn't ever think about how many times the question "do you have any brothers or sisters", pops up in a getting to know somebody conversation.  It's literally just behind what do you for work.  Nearly every time I've been asked if I have a brother or sister, and I have to say, "he passed away three years ago", it ends the conversation.  It's a dark thought, but I know that if you're listening in, you've laughed at me.

I think the thing that I'm having a really hard time with is not being a brother anymore.  This has just popped up within the last year or so.  It hits hard Josh.  Just after you left us, I was mostly concerned with holding it together for Dad and Mom, and really didn't consider a lot of how I would be affected.  The not being a brother anymore is a real shocker.  My desire to have a brother and be a brother has definitely changed how introverted I used to be compared to how I am now.  I've had more deep and meaningful conversations with my friends than I ever did before.  I know that we were closer at the end, than at the beginning, and I am truly regretful for that.  I often wonder if I would've been closer, earlier, if it would have made a difference? And I can't help but think that it would have.  I can't change our thing.  But I can change future relationships.  I can be a better brother to someone else.

I sent Mom a text earlier today.  It was a simple question.  3 years tomorrow?  Her answer.  Yes.  I debated if I should send it because I knew the answer.  I wanted her to know that I was thinking about you.  Missing you isn't the right term.  Sometimes I feel paralyzed.  Your death still hurts.  I'm sitting her typing this thinking about all of it.  And how much I hate that you're gone. Tears are flowing.

My hope in the eternal is what keeps me going.  I can't wait until we all see you again.  I think about God's goodness in the midst of it all.  It's hard to see sometimes.  There's a song called The Goodness of God that rips me apart every time we sing it.  The second verse says, I love your voice. You have led me through the fire.  In darkest night, You are close like no other.  Those are anchor lyrics for me right now.  There have been a lot of dark nights.  But God has been close.  Someone reading this post needs to know that I know that you are severely struggling with finding the goodness of God right now.  I want you to know, that it's there.  I promise.  I found it.  Even in the worst times, I've found it.  Leave a comment or send me a message somewhere and I'll pray that if you're struggling to find it, that you will.