My younger brother is not being raised by the same parents that raised me.  Yes, they look like the people who raised me, and they do live in the house where I grew up, but I swear there are times when I have no idea who these people are.  If it comes out later that my parents were abducted by aliens and replaced with clones, I really wouldn't have that much trouble believing it (I would however raise questions about the intelligence of a species which kidnaps suburbanites such as my parents).

            I am the oldest, defined as "he who got here first," and looked upon my childhood as a time to happily learn the lessons of love and life from my parents.  They, on the other hand, looked at it as an experiment.  I think their attitude was, "Well, if we screw this one up, we can always make more.  We're young."  As I did not turn out to be a raging psychopath or a cross-dressing talk show host, I guess in the end they did a good job. 

            Seizing upon their experience, my parents eagerly tried to conceive another child, while I eagerly tried to conceive a way to get them to get a puppy instead.  They won, and gave me a little sister, whom, for the record, I did try to return.  She is the middle child, defined as "she who hated the oldest and the youngest from infancy to adulthood," and it was her responsibility to grow up and conform to all the stereotypes that people who never have children dream up for middle children.  My parents applied basically the same rules to her as they did to me, and in the end she turned out ok too.

            Then came my brother, the youngest, defined as "he who is allowed to get away with things that would have gotten the first two children beaten with a snow shovel".  It is his job to be spoiled rotten and get away with just about anything.  He's very good at it, too.

            As an example, both my sister and I had to eat lima beans.  We both hated lima beans.  When I say "hated" I am talking about the same type of hate that cats feel toward water, or Americans feel towards the IRS.  That kind of hate.  We were not allowed to leave the table until we ate all our lima beans, and as a result of that I once missed two and a half weeks of school.  I spent that entire time at the kitchen table trying to choke down three lousy beans.  According to my father, I was "building character."  My brother not only is allowed to leave the table before he finishes his lima beans, but he can substitute any vegetable he wants, like pizza.  My brother's definition of a vegetable also includes corn dogs and peanut butter.  He doesn't even have to come to the table if he doesn't want to.  He can eat off the floor in his room, and my parents just "overlook" it.

            Dating is an even better example.  When I was in eighth grade, I wanted to take this sweet young thing to the movies.  She was everything I could want in a date, which at thirteen meant she wore a bra and was alive, so I asked my parents for permission to ask her out.

            Hoooooleeeey Cow.  My parents were so beside themselves we had to set extra places at dinner.  Their little darling wanted to ask some floozy on a date? 

"Mom, she's not a floozy," I argued. 

"Does she wear a bra?"  I nodded emphatically, as I had researched the subject intently.  "Then she's a floozy."  Mom was known not to think all that clearly in times of crisis.

There followed for the next two weeks one of the most agonizing periods of my childhood.  All I wanted was a yes or no answer and maybe a ride and instead I got speeches and questions and audio-visual presentations with a level of detail not seen by the Joint Chiefs of Staff.  Finally, after much deliberation, and promises that I would not get married before I at least finished the ninth grade, my parents decided it would be acceptable to let me ask the object of my desires to a movie.  I did, and learned that afternoon that the only desire she had toward me was to have her older brother run over me with his car.  I was crushed (almost literally), and would have to wait some time (seven years, three months, two weeks, and four days) until my first date.

            My brother, on the other hand, went on his first date when he was in sixth grade, was given new clothes, money, and the keys to the car for the evening.  Now, that's fair.  Then my parents wonder why I play fun games like “Catch the Javelin” with him when I come home.

            He comes and goes as he pleases, as long as he does his chores.  His chores are defined as taking the trash from the kitchen to the door leading to the garage, and actually closing the front door behind him.  For this, he earns an allowance of $37.50 a week, tax-free.  Not to sound bitter, but when I was his age, my chores broke Chinese child labor laws, and my annual allowance was slightly less than the change that can be found in the cushions of the couch you are seated on.

            My siblings and I each love our parents dearly.  My sister and I for the strong, steady discipline and support they provided for us in our formative years.  My brother because he has more privileges and less responsibility than Britain's royal family.

That's ok, though.  He loans me a few bucks every so often.