My sister just sent me this, about my brother:
Mitchell, I recently heard that Jimmy had been at Nanny Cobbs last year some time, I don't know when. Mrs. Cobb fed him but he just stayed around and didn't offer to leave. She said that he wasn't acting like he was all there and that when it got later in the afternoon she wasn't sure what to do, and was probably kindof scared, so she called the cops and they came and got him and took him to, I think, a homeless shelter. Nanny Cobb died last week on the 9th of this month. I use to write to Jimmy once in a while but haven't heard from him in a few years. He never answered the last letter I sent last summer.
Edgar, a very sad and probably all too common story.
Writing in care of the Salvation Army might help find him. The Salvation Army is noted for reuniting families.
I don't want him, just crious to learn of his fate.
Edgar--
Does your sister want him?
No. He tries to latch onto us like the old man on Sinbad's back. We can't have him around, but we each want to know if he's alive.
Edgar--
I sympathize. Several members of Mr. Noddy's family are much more attractive at a distance than up close and sociable.
I feel a bit of empathy for him. I guess because I have seen him in moments of lucidity, times when he could be human. When he was obviously gone wrong and already a parasite, my Mom let him hang on as long as he wished. This despite the fact he stole money from her and cleaned out the refrigerator frequently. She said, "Somebody's got to take care of him. He can't take care of himself." I was long torn between caring about him and being outraged. He took a strong dislike to me for the times I tried to take him in hand. I once heard him speaking about me to our youngest brother, saying, "You'll forgive him. But, I never will." Time softened the animosity.
Once, he passed out in back of a pick up truck at a beer joint. He got a lawyer to get him (some say) $40,000 damages after it backed over him. He took the money and ran off to Mexico, where rumor has it he got married. He blew the whole pot and eased back into the states to take up his old ways. It was a number of years before I saw him, because he had hid out, fearing somebody would want his money.
Edgar--
Your brother sounds as though he belongs in a mathematical set with nuclear waste, cobras, hogweed and the ebola virus.
And, as they say, them's his good points.
