Getting to Know Brett
How do you tell someone about a person you love?
You could start with the facts. Where they were born. Where they went to school. The things they liked and the things they did.
But facts can only tell you so much.
To really know Brett, you need the stories. The ones our family still tells—the ones that begin with, “Remember when Brett…?”
There are hundreds of them.
Here are just a few.
When Brett was four or five years old, he went shopping with his Aunt Jenny. As they walked through the store, he proudly announced,
“I can use my P.O.P. money.”
Jenny laughed.
“P.O.P. money? What’s P.O.P. money?”
Brett answered without missing a beat.
“My Put-on-Pants money.”
Jenny laughed harder.
She knew exactly what that meant.
Brett preferred wearing less than more, so “put-on-pants” became a daily task on his chore chart. A little unconventional—but it worked.
A few years later, Brett stood beside his desk during his third-grade Mother’s Day celebration. His teacher asked each student to sing to their moms.
The music began, and Brett started singing with his classmates.
I could hear every word.
Every syllable.
I could barely hold it together.
I had never heard him sing like that before.
In my mind, I saw my little four-year-old boy struggling to say words—only able to get the first syllable out.
And there he was singing.
Singing every word.
It remains one of the greatest Mother’s Day gifts I’ve ever been given.
As the years passed, Brett discovered mythology at school—and once it caught his attention, he wanted more.
He loved movies like Atlantis and Hercules. He devoured Rick Riordan’s books, following Percy Jackson and the other characters through worlds built around Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Norse mythology.
But Brett didn’t just enjoy the stories.
He wanted to know the stories behind the stories.
He noticed which characters came from the original myths, how writers reimagined them, and where a book or movie stayed true to the mythology—or wandered somewhere completely different.
And Brett had opinions.
When the Percy Jackson movies came out, he insisted that Addison and I watch them with him. I couldn’t contribute much when the conversation turned to mythology, but that never stopped Brett and Addison.
They talked about what the movies got right.
What they got wrong.
What worked.
And what definitely did not.
For Brett, enjoying a story was only the beginning. He wanted to explore it, pull it apart, compare it to what he already knew, and talk about it with someone who wanted to do the same.
And if Brett loved something, there was a very good chance the people he loved were going to hear about it too.
By eleventh grade, another interest had taken Brett beyond his regular school day. He enrolled in the Veterinary Science program at BOCES.
He loved the class, his teacher, and especially the animals.
The work didn’t always come easily—not because he wasn’t capable, but because he worried he might accidentally hurt one of the animals. His teacher encouraged him not to worry so much. She reminded him they would be okay.
When I attended Meet-the-Teacher Night, I understood why Brett loved the program. As I walked through the classrooms, it was obvious how much he cared about the animals.
At the end of the year, each student received a certificate recognizing something special about them.
Brett’s read:
The Gentlest.
When I think about Brett, I can’t imagine an award that suited him better.
Away from school, life with Brett brought plenty of other memorable moments.
When Brett got older, he loved walking the two blocks to visit his Nana and Pop. If he decided he wanted to see them, off he’d go.
I’d find out he’d left when my mom would call.
“Brett’s here.”
Then she’d add,
“He didn’t have a coat or shoes on.”
It was winter.
If anyone asked whether he was cold, his answer was always the same.
“I don’t feel the cold.”
That was Brett.
Oh, and Brett adopted one of my throw blankets.
It wasn’t especially soft or expensive. He simply liked it.
He wrapped it around his shoulders, pulled it close, and wore it around the house. Before long, it wasn’t my blanket anymore.
It belonged to Brett.
The same thing happened with other things. A stuffed animal. A favorite T-shirt. More often than not, the item belonged to his sister or one of his brothers.
Oddly, no one ever seemed to mind.
It simply became his.
Years later, Brett faced a big decision.
For months, Brett’s cousin Zachary had been encouraging Brett and Addison to move to Buffalo. Addison had lived there before, and Brett liked the idea—but he wanted his brother to go with him.
Then Addison decided he wasn’t going. He encouraged Brett to go without him if Buffalo was what he really wanted.
Brett hesitated.
He thought about it.
Then he decided to go.
Brett and I flew out of Phoenix together. We would travel as far as Baltimore before parting ways. Brett would catch a connecting flight to Buffalo, where Zachary would meet him, and I would continue on to Long Island.
There was just one complication: Brett had never flown by himself.
So we made a plan.
When we landed in Baltimore, we would grab something to eat. Then I would walk with Brett to his gate, make sure he knew where he needed to be, and say goodbye before heading to my own flight.
At least, that was the plan.
Our flight left Phoenix very late, and by the time we landed in Baltimore, my next flight was already boarding.
Suddenly, there was no time to eat. No time to find Brett’s gate together. No time for the careful goodbye we had planned.
Instead, Brett walked me to my gate.
We hugged and said goodbye. I boarded my plane, and Brett turned around and headed off through the airport alone.
I didn’t know it then, but that would be the last time I ever hugged my son.
Brett made it to Buffalo.
And once he got there, everything was new.
He moved in with roommates he barely knew and landed his first real job. He didn’t drive, so he figured out Buffalo’s public transportation and learned how to get himself where he needed to go. He paid his own bills, shopped for groceries, and cooked his own meals.
Things most adults eventually learn to do.
For Brett, they all came at once.
He had wanted Addison beside him when he started. Instead, he boarded the plane alone, moved across the country, and began figuring things out for himself.
We had planned for me to help Brett find his way.
Instead, Brett found his own.
It wasn’t until we went through Brett’s things that we noticed how much of what he kept had a story.
Brett wasn’t materialistic. He didn’t need a lot of things. When he found something he liked, he used it—sometimes until there was almost nothing left. There is a shirt Sarai would love to have now, but Brett wore it until it was so threadbare that it belongs in a memory box rather than a closet.
That made what remained stand out.
There was a T-shirt and sweatshirt from his time at BOCES. An old Field Day shirt from fifth or sixth grade, covered with his classmates’ signatures. A tie-dyed T-shirt Bethany had made, decided she didn’t want, and given to Brett. It had what looked like a cityscape across the front, and Brett really liked it.
There were the Skylanders he and Luke had played with when they were younger. Gifts from Nana and Pop. Numerous things that had once belonged to Addison.
And stuffed animals.
Brett loved stuffed animals.
Among them were two Civil War teddy bears that had belonged to Garrick and two teddy bears that had once belonged to Bethany. Like the throw blanket, things that belonged to his brothers and sister had somehow found their way into Brett’s life—and stayed there.
There wasn’t much that felt random.
Going through Brett’s belongings was almost like seeing pieces of his life laid out in front of us.
The people he loved. The places he had been. The experiences that mattered to him. The things that simply brought him joy.
We knew all of those things about Brett.
We had just never seen them all together like that before.
Together, they made visible something we had always known.
If there was one word to describe Brett, it was love.
He loved deeply. And he was deeply loved.
Once we saw it, we could see it everywhere.
When Nana and Pop took Brett to a nursery one day to buy flowers, Brett fell in love with the place. Small gardens dotted the property, with paths to wander, water features, swings, benches, and rocks where you could sit and enjoy the view.
Brett wanted me to see it too.
So we went. More than once.
Not because we needed flowers or plants. We went to walk the paths, sit in the gardens, and enjoy a place Brett loved together.
He did the same thing with the things he enjoyed.
When Brett gathered people to play games, he wanted Sarai included with Beth, Addison, Luke, Dakota, and whoever else joined in. When mythology captured his imagination, he insisted Addison and I watch Percy Jackson with him.
A place. A story. A game.
If Brett loved something, he wanted to share it.
And if Brett loved you, he wanted you there.
There are hundreds more stories.
Some are funny. Some still make us shake our heads. Others bring back a voice, a laugh, a moment we would give anything to experience one more time.
We will keep telling them.
Because every story keeps another piece of Brett in the world.
And perhaps, as you come to know Brett through our work, you’ll carry a little piece of him with you too.
That is one of the reasons From Brett with love exists.
Brett’s story didn’t end with him.
We are still telling it.