three little birdies

When I moved to New York, although I immediately fell in love with the city, I also quickly recognized how one could feel lonely. It’s a big pond little fish type of thing, I think. Especially when you’re from somewhere so opposite of here and your background looks more often different than your peers. I’m blessed because I’ve gotten to experience the city with my cousin Taylor by my side. Someone who whole heartedly understands me and knows exactly where I come from. We’ve been two little Lowerys, riding the waves hand in hand and I couldn’t have asked for a better person to partner up with.

For the past two weeks, my little brother Will has been staying with me in the city. The two Lowerys have become three and New York is all the brighter. It’s Will’s first time in the big apple and his fresh eyes have given me a new vision or at least a clearer one, of things I’ve grown used to. Silly things really, how miserable the subway is on a hot day, exactly how gross some of the smells are on the street, how big Central Park really is. Other things too, how smart my friends are, how it feels when it seems like everyone knows things you’ve never been taught, how people from so many different backgrounds with so many different lives can fit perfectly into a room together and find out they’re actually a lot a like.

The reminders have been beautiful, they’ve given me a new appriciation for those I surround myself with. Over these two weeks, my friends have felt more like family than they ever have before. Though as incredible as they all are and I’m sure have always been, I can’t stop myself from asking, is it that my friends are truly so great or rather is it because Will is the greatest?

Will’s interpretations of each of them, his favorite things about them, his conversations with them, are they a reflection of my friends or are they a reflection of my brother?

My brother and I have always been close, sure we’ve had times when we didn’t get a long as children, but I’d say we’ve loved each other and would have taken a bullet for one another our whole lives. Sometimes it’s hard to tell if it’s the shared blood that makes you feel that way about someone, or if it’s really a choice. An unrelated, unbiological, unbiased choice- I love you because I want to, not because I have to. After this stay, I can say with complete assurance that I would murder cities for my brother. I would take rounds and rounds of bullets for that man, without question, because he is the best person I have ever met. And our shared blood, that’s just a plus. If I get to have an ounce of the same magic that Will has rivers of running through his veins, then I like myself a little more too. And the beautiful thing, is I know he feels the same way. Even if he isn’t going to write a mushy blog post about it.

There was a night that some of my male friends took Will out on the town. I woke up each hour to check his location, worried about my small town brother, that he was doing okay out there in the big pond. I woke up to knocks on my door around 5am. “Sis I wanna talk to you, I know it’s late.”

I’m going to keep that conversation in my heart forever. A drunken Will, telling me how much he loved me, how much my friends love me, how proud he is to have me as a sister. And my telling him about how great he is, all the gifts he doesn’t even know he has, and us traveling back through years of hard times and clearing the valleys of death together, unpacking it all, and reclaiming our path. That conversation meant more to me than anything. That conversation distinguishes our friendship and loyalty to one another as a choice.

What’s even better, is we both feel the same way about our third Lowery, Taylor. One of our friends, Jin, said “you guys are like two sides of the same coin” and we all knew what he meant, because we feel like that too. It feels like Taylor and Will are an extension of parts of me. Like we all can see something in each other that no one else really can. An understanding. Maybe we have the blood to thank for that.

Having two of my favorite people in the world around me so much these two weeks, has felt like a gift. Getting to go camping, to go to functions as a unit, to experience things together- it’s turned New York even more into home. I just wish it never had to end.

Will has given me so much, a new appriciation for my friends, the city, even for myself. If I thought for a second that he’d like it here longterm, I’d move him in tomorrow.

When the three Lowery’s have to go back to two, we’ll talk about you so much it’ll feel like two and a half. I love you, Chills.