There were a lot of issue I had to work through when I was a child.
For instance, how my father never thought to keep a picture of me in his office.
Instead, me and my twin brother Enzo were folded into a forgotten pocket of his fine Italian leather wallet – and if you have ever owned any kind of wallet you know whatever scrap of paper that's jammed inside its seams will never see the light of day until its untimely demise in a garbage incinerator.
That's just the way things are. Nothing personal.
Nathan, my second eldest brother, had the pleasure of sitting on a book shelf in the family library. It was nonsensical and random for a single picture of a twenty year man to be framed on the fifth tier of our library, but hey – who else would keep Jay Gatsby and Dante entertained while their frayed pages withered away like their authors.
It was a small accomplishment considering how gray and bleak our house was. Blessed my late mother's heart for trying to decorate our home like the cover of Home Goods but nothing could save this asylum from looking more than what it really was – a prison.
But alas there was one shining light in our home that even I couldn't deny, and that was my eldest brother Theo.
Every time I walked by my father's office and peaked into the cracks of his door, I would see the one thing my dad held near and dear to his heart. It was irrationally dazzling and I admit my heart use to skip a beat just thinking about it.
I likened it to the star on top of a Christmas tree, and from my place crushed against the door hinge I spotted what seemed to be the greatest thing in the world.
On my father's desk was a small image of Theo occupying a nice polished, cherry wood frame right next to his computer screen – the golden throne is what I liked to call it. It was the proverbial front row of the classroom where only the best and the brightest students sat like shining trophies whenever the principle peered into the room.
He was the first and last person my father would see everyday.
And my thirst for that throne drove me insane.