I Was A Younger Brother and Other Life-Threatening Experiences

I Was A Younger Brother

and other life-threatening experiences

A Memoir by

Daniel Burch Fiddler

How ironic it is that the two most important times in your life, when you are born and when you die, are completely beyond your control? No one ever asked me if I would have preferred being the first born- My parents just went ahead and had my brother first. There was no coin toss, no “Who ever gets the short straw waits,” not even a “Who had his hand up first?” It was David first and Daniel second...learn to live with it.

I didn’t have much choice BUT to learn to live with it. For starters older brothers are bigger. Thus the term, little brother. Older brothers are stronger. Thus the term black and blue. Older brothers are usually smarter. Thus the term ‘We will do it my way’, and if you don’t do it their way it can lead back to black and blue.

My brother David was fourteen months older than I and was a natural born leader, That left me the natural born follower. Following David’s lead seemed the easiest way to get along and the best way to keep from being left out or punched out. He was always so sure of himself that I seldom thought to question how foolhardy or even down right dangerous some of his decisions were. Not following David was never an option. I would follow him on adventures that would sometimes scare the hell out of me, and on occasion, even put my life in danger.

This is the humorous account of my efforts to survive the many dreams and schemes of my influential older brother. These stories take the two brothers from the end of the Great Depression 1930’s to the early 1950’s,

This book is dedicated to younger and older siblings everywhere and is written to entertain both adults and adolescents.