From the crab to the grouch

I am not lazy.

I am, however, a big fan of naps. Which makes having the brother that I have such a mismatch.

My brother and only sibling Oscar, is 34 years old and he is the hardest-working guy that I have ever met. The man does not understand the concept of standing still or taking a break. I swear the next time he stands quietly in one position it will be because of rigor mortis.

The guy works so hard at everything that he does, he makes me look like an industrious lump of sod. When he was 25, he wore ties, and was ready to chase success in the real world. I am 25 and I sometimes eat my lunch watching Tom chase Jerry.

The differences do not end there. He's an athletic guy, and I still look like the guy who thinks strawberry shakes should count as a serving of fruit. I fret and worry about pretty much everything; he makes Donald Trump sound like George Costanza. He's tough as nails. I am tough as Eeyore. He crosses the t's and dots the i's; my next mistake-free article will be my frist.

(See?)

It has always been that way, and sometimes it has not been easy to be friendly, let alone brotherly, when you see the world so differently. But we have worked at it. Someday we will be Shaggy and Scooby, but the days when we were Khruschev and Kennedy are long gone, and that is something for which I will always be grateful to him.

I will always be thankful to him for showing me the profession I have. The first job I ever heard existed was journalism, because he wanted to be a reporter. So all I heard growing up was how great journalism was. I got curious, and here I am. It's great, though sometimes I wonder what would have happened if instead he had said he wanted to be a hairdresser or a ballerina.

I will always be grateful to him for being a great teacher. He has taught me how to forgive, how to forget the bad moments, how to be a friend, and, not surprisingly, considering those three things, when I was six, he taught me to write the letter "f" in cursive, which comes in handy when I am asked to write down my middle initial or the shape of my abdomen.

And I will always be grateful to the Great Sibling-Maker in the Sky for pairing me up with a guy like him, a role model before being a role model was cool. When we were living in Chile, and my dad left for the U.S., Oscar had to be older brother and father figure for a teenager with a bad attitude and grades to match.

It could not have been easy, but he never wavered. Made me resent him at times, but when I finished my first half-decent short story last year, I dedicated it to him. Being the unstoppable force that he is, he read the story, liked it, and is now working on the movie version. I am not expecting any awards, but he's definitely got the right first name for them.

After living together for 15 years, we have seen each other five times in the last 10. He is still thousands of miles away, living with his wife Catherine and hoping for the stork to pay them a visit someday. He once said that if they have a boy, he is going to name him after me. I am hoping they have a girl, so the poor kid can be spared all those "Little Mermaid" jokes.

That is, unless he names her Ariel.

He's a great guy, a man I have learned to respect and for whose admiration I fight every day. Just 24 hours ago, I spoke with him on the phone, and after telling him of my latest adventures in the world of journalism, instead of saying, "hey, you're rubbing it in, that's what I wanted to be," he simply said, "you are my hero."

That's when I knew all this working hard had gotten to him. He needs to take a break soon.

I am not his hero. He's mine.

Sebastian Moraga is the city, political reporter for the Columbia Basin Herald, whose editor is wondering why she didn't meet Oscar frist, er, first.