Brontonious Maximus: My little brother.

Anthony is a generally happy guy.

We have nicknames for him. It started with “Antwan” and “Anton”. The names evolved to Twantin, TinMan, One-ton-twan, TinTonnyWanny, and my favorite, Brontonious Maximus. There are dozens more. He lets me have fun with it.

Anthony takes a lot of nonsense from the rest of us, between my mother believing he is a perpetual baby who simply can’t remember to wash his face if she doesn’t remind him (several times, until hes annoyed), and the rest of us making jokes at his expense. Despite that, he remains positive an good natured. That’s why he’s everyones favorite.

Even though he was laboring since 6am in the heat, he still smiled and took some time to make me laugh. For instance, when I was taking picture of the whole crew in action, he occasionally looked up and posed.

Yes, Anthony. I see you.

He also turned to me, with a genuine concern and said, “OH! Alison, did you hear that macho man died!?” … I hadn’t. “Sure, yeah, the guy who sings Macho Man! Isn’t that awful?” … I guess so, Anthony. 

Anthony's "Macho Man Pose"

So when Anthony returned from work yesterday, looking unhappy and claiming to be in pain, I should have known he meant it. We all should have. We hardly reacted in a concerned manner, though. It’s not like I didn’t believe him when he told me, I just reacted as any good sister would. I made him a sandwhich and called him something obnoxious and patronizing like “Antwany, my little baby cutie brother.” He didn’t seem to mind.

That’s sort of the Amorello way. When I fractured my arm in the 6th grade after an embarrassing scooter accident, no one believed me. I walked around for days in pain before I was reluctantly brought to the hospital. Even after the diagnosis, my family remained skeptical. It’s how we are. We don’t coddle eachother. If any one of us was going to grow up to be a hypocondriac, we were conditioned early on to cut the crap.

Hours later, when he sat on the couch watching American Idol with my mother, we all REALLY should have known something was wrong. Normally Anthony would be sleeping at that time or even out with friends, but he didn’t seem up for either. He just sat there on the couch, listening to my mothers riveting commentary and if he complained, I didn’t hear it.

I called my father at 6:45AM to find out where I was headed for my second day of observation and documentation. He said I should go to Memorial Hospital to see Anthony. He was up all night, very sick, and no one knew what was wrong with him.

“I feel awful,” my dad said, “I feel like I made him work too hard yesterday.” No, I reasoned, that wasn’t it.

“Well I at least feel bad for mocking him and calling him weak in my head.” Yes, well, I reminded him, he mocked him out loud as well.

“Oh, right. Well, go see him today.” he instucted.

And I will. As it turns out, his illness is not work related and of course, he will be OK. But while he is in the hospital, I suspect they miss his good humor on the job. I miss it in the house, too. Never fear though friends, Brontonious Maximus is tough. He will be back on the road soon.