Getting to Know Avery

According to his MySpace profile, Avery Stone Fish is male, 8'11", 23 years old, and tests "doodie for the mooshieness for a living." I had always thought he wanted to be a veterinarian, with the way he acted coy around dogs and subtly ignored our brother Aarlo's allergy to cats, begging for one every birthday from age seven to age 10. The picture on his profile shows him breastfeeding a stuffed animal, which lends credence to my theory.

Avery is a wonderful kid whom I enjoy spending time with, but I feel the gulf of age between us. When he first saw my braces almost 10 years ago, he ran out of the room, almost in tears. When he got braces I did not even notice; in fact, I had to call another brother to confirm that Avery had braces. It is hard keeping up with him when I am away at college; his MySpace helps.

My brothers express themselves musically. Hugh plays banjo in a jug band called Hobo Slobo and the Strong Armed Jugnuts. Aarlo warbles in chorus. Avery loves to belt out "diaria fegalo, the song," which is Italian for "diarrhea figaro." I have heard the song many times, but until seeing his MySpace profile, I never knew its name. When we all lived at home, Aarlo would periodically break out into song, and Avery would join in, harmonizing his career as a shit tester with his passion for music.

Before I left for college three years ago, I tried to spend time with him every day, but Pokemon never attracted me, nor did this Jimmy Neutron business. I wish he would watch Doug, or even Rugrats. He has gotten better about ruining the ending of movies, like he did for X-Men. Affectionate, watching a movie with him involves a head constantly leaning on your shoulder, a hand constantly rubbing your arm, and another steadily tapping his arm, touching his face, or performing another of his many tics.

When not jumping all over the place, or playing sword games in the backyard with our neighbor Reed, he can be seen reading his favorite book (hint: it's not a love story). He is more like me than our brother Aarlo-who burrows into his computer-or our brother Hugh-attached to his banjo-but he reads less than I did at his age. More social, though. As the youngest kid at camp, in a situation where I would retreat into my head, Avery attempted to learn everyone's name. That failed, though, so he called all the boys, girls, counselors, and administrators "George."

Camp is in New Hampshire, but Avery hails from what he calls "doodie central, diariasville," also known as Syracuse, New York. The whole family came and visited me when I was in China; other than that, he has never left the country, but spends a lot of time outside of "doodie central," either at camp, on Marthas Vineyard, or in Naples, Florida, where my grandparents winter.

He has lived in "doodie central" for "all of the squishy days" and has inferred "i am the only one there, i guess i am the boss." Pre-teens, sometimes even more than teens, think they are the only ones with stuff to do. When I was home Avery would beg me to play Nintendo football with him, and downstairs we would trudge. At night we would sometimes play chess. He would stare intensely at the pieces, scratch his ear and then move impulsively, just as I do.

Maybe because I left for college at an age where he still had the economic sensibility of Rainman, I am surprised by how well he is doing. Apparently, he "gets about 250 thousand a second eating doodie cause' I am the only one who wants to test it. I eat it for a lot of money $$$." When not snacking on doodie, he hates salmon, salad, and Indian food. His friend Alexa's dad is a butcher, and he would always eat the chicken prepared at their home. My mom says he and Alexa do not hang out anymore, so maybe that is where the divorced designation on his profile comes from.

Perhaps the only thing that did not surprise me was his answering religion with Jewish. Until he turned 10, Avery wore his kippah everywhere. Now that he is 12, he only wears it at the Syracuse Hebrew Day School, where he spends most of his day. He does not wear it at our Shabbat dinner, but I can see the gleam of pride on his face when he picks up the challah bread and passes a piece to each of us. Unfortunately, he never washes his hands before dinner.