I posted recently about the passing of my brother. He was named Rodney Steven Davis. I don’t have any memory of where the Rodney came from but using it was probably a good way to get on his bad side, not that he had much of a bad side.

We spent our formative years following my father around the Southeast and Texas in pursuit of his USAF career. I was four years older so I had more moves than Steve. Being raised by a career non-commissioned officer can give you a “focused” outlook on life. We never had joblists, we were told to “fall in” and given our “details for the day”. I was bigger than Steve and I had athletics as an intro into the various communities to which we moved. Steve never took a backseat and always had more friends than I did. He was the more social of the two of us. He learned to cook and took up golf. I made cereal and PBJ sandwiches.

My overseas service during the Vietnam period was in Greenland where I was a lieutenant with an office job. I was in the position of having both a brother and father in Vietnam, though at different times. Steve and I both scrambled to find out if our civilian father was okay after the start of the Tet offensive in 1968. I searched to find something in the the Thule AB Greenland exchange to send to Steve while he was an Infantry officer in Vietnam. My plastic bottles of shampoo were not as welcome as some of those aluminum packages of popcorn that could be cooked under primitive conditions. He was wounded twice but made a safe return.

He was the more spontaneous and generous of the two of us. We have a still younger brother, David, who at one time was living in New Hampshire. He found himself needing to make a big change in his life. Steve didn’t think twice of getting a large vehicle and driving to NH and bringing David and his property back to Alabama, helping him find a job and place to live. Steve was one for immediate solutions to problems. We were alike in our politics, reading matter and worship for John Wayne. Even before Facebook and eMail we could meet after 6 months or a year and pick up a conversation where we left it.

I probably won’t miss his “cheesey” moustache and unhealthy attachment to the University of Alabama football but our world has now lost a good man, a great American, father and grandfather.

I’ve lost my brother.