Brandon only knew one man as his father and that was my nephew. His biological father was never around. Brandon's mother died and my nephew took Brandon as his own at a very early age.
Brandon is Dead
Last night I sat in this very same place and wrote a joyful piece about my family. Tonight, after getting news that one of my grand nephews, Brandon, has died, I am overcome with sadness. He died alone, in the home of his sister, in his sleep. He was found today by her after calling a friend to come and bust through a locked door. There he lay with blood coming from his mouth and nose. The paramedics said he had been dead for about eight hours.
His father, my nephew, said that Brandon had been to a "friends" house where the father of that friend had given him several tablets of Meth. (I am ignorant about the ways this drug is packaged so I am only repeating what was told to me). I suppose this resulted in an overdose and caused his death. An autopsy will answer those questions.
I am writing this now because I am overcome with emotions--anger (lots and lots of anger), deep, gut wrenching sadness, and frustration-- to mention a few for which I can find words. But this isn't about me. This is about a young man who lost his mother at an early age to death and was left with a man who raised him as his own. This young man I remember as a young boy growing into a teenager with all the trials, tests, and temptations that come with that age. He was a handsome young man, dark curly hair and blue eyes, a little on the small size in height but stocky. He struggled in school but had odd jobs to make himself some pocket money. His father was, at times, hard on him, but loved him just the same.
Eventually, Brandon came to work in his father's business, but became undependable and combative. He had started selling and using drugs. He was then told to the leave the home because of the influence and chaos he brought to that home where also lived his younger siblings. He eventually moved in with his sister who was living on her own.
Just recently, he had visited my brother, his grandfather, who had had open heart surgery. The last words spoken between them were words of forgiveness and love. And, now today, Brandon is dead.
Drugs are the modern day Plague. They kill, destroy, mutilate, annihilate, and obliterate families and lives physically, emotionally, and mentally. Drugs are vile, evil and hold nothing but pain for those who get bitten by their fangs, attacked by their poisonous tentacles, and swallowed whole by the demon mouths of their addiction.
This Plague is no respecter of person, privilege, place, or race. It is an equal opportunity destroyer. It is the snake that crawls down halls and up walls of homes and schools, through alley ways, streets, and playgrounds. It is the face of death. It is the face of nightmares. It is the face of society heading for
damnation. Drugs are the greatest War of all time. This war is sometimes hidden but always alive and well eating the heart of who we are.
Love your children. Pray for them. Pay attention to their wants and needs.
Know their friends and listen and look for the signs of distress. And, I must add to you, our youth, please do the same for your friends. Afterall, you are their peers and have a greater impact at this time of thier lives than anyone else. Love them that much to protect them from the ones who feed them the poison which will kill them.
I don't know if this is the answer. I try to think what could have, should have, would have been done to save this one life. I wonder what I, not they, or he, could or should have done and I am left with no answer. I am only left empty and sad with tears shedding for a life that was taken so young in this horrible War of Drugs.
Kathy
Words by Kathy Lockhart
Read 870 times
Written on 2007-12-11 at 05:31
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