Ah the holidays, and loss.
After my brother died I said it would be a good idea to do a virtual irish wake (bring all the virtual drink you wish) to remember those who have gone before us, and how we will remember them.
So let me start this, with both my dad and my older brother.
Suffice it to say, they never had a good relationship, and I fear they never really learned to appreciate each other's quirks. Dad wanted Max to have a stable job, a good life, and all that. These were the things my brother really could not do fully.
So what are the things I remember both for?
My dad, well, we got fairly close near his death. One time we flew down there, he had to be in the Hospital on an emergency basis, for blood transfusions and my mom had a surgery in a completely different hospital, so I took care of dad.
That was somewhat special, watching weird foods with Zimmerman with dad and Bear Grills Survival program, and hearing war stories from WW II. Some of them he never told anybody but my husband and ironically my older brother, who could not believe them. He told me those since he said I would also get it since I have been in a few shoot outs. While they were never as intense, I did get it. What he did, he did to survive, fully. I will leave it at that.
My brother, well over the years he became increasingly right wing. Oh I must admit, he truly hated the fact that Americans elected that man in the WH. If he had been in the States he would have been your archetypical white male, aka tea party. His emais, I stopped reading them a long time ago, included jokes that were on the far right of the spectrum, and he sent those to my mother too, so that did not help. Nevertheless, when one day I managed to get on the phone with him four months ago, and he started to spout those jokes, I went he must be doing better. So yes. I will remember him for those jokes and it is a mixed memory.
He was my little window into RW ideology and how pervasive it is. He was also very jealous of the rest of his siblings, especially my brother since well, he is very successful in his field, and I mean extremely successful. He works seven days a week, and if he did not have vacation he would do this 365 days of the year. So when people people start talking about doctor pay, he has earned every red cent of what he gets paid, and as an employee he hardly makes that much. But due to those jealousies my older brother really never asked. People travel from all over the world to see my other brother, but my older brother never dared ask. My other brother kept up with it, and talked with his doctors, but such is life. He was willing to use an air ambulance, but my older brother never said yes.
So things that I will remember, my dad's sense of humor and going on with life, and his...let's call it what it is, atheism. Where was god when his family got massacred during the holocaust? Yet he still sent us to a Jewish School and we attended temple every year. He loved the music. Oh and he did listen to midnight mass every year on the TV from the Vatican. He loved religious music, and Yddish songs.
My brother for his love of pure bred dogs. I got the photo of the only one that staid at home. His love for his daugher and wife, and yes, his bad right wing humor. I might not have been able to stand it, but it was what made him what he was.
So, to the both of them,
And for those who need it, here is the coffee, virtual and all, 
= new reply since forum marked as read
These are always wonderful and weird times with friends and family and, hopefully, more fun than drama.
and 
I have more than one to share...
My father passed over a decade ago but it was a major event in my psyche and still is. He was a war veteran to his peers and a terrorist/ogre to his family. If he weren't related to me I would have crossed the street to avoid him in public. But when he was dying, I traveled across the continent to visit him one last time. It was a horrid, long death and I feel I wished it on him back in my childhood when I was enslaved in his home and longing to be free of him and all that he was. On my last visit, I saw a withered person, a literal sack of bones and tumors, scared of dying and meeting his maker (in his belief system) because he knew what damage he had done to the lives of numerous individuals. I told him that I forgave him and that he had nothing to fear in dying, as is my understanding of how the life/death transition works. We made our peace and he asked me to stay and talk to him about my adult life and experiences... what he wanted to hear were my comical tales and misadventures on the road as a truck driver, I had many to tell and he was satiated by them. that day is what I would prefer to remember, unpleasant as it was, although there were a few memorable times in my childhood when he was in a mood to impart important knowledge, they were intermixed with the terror sessions and I would rather not bring those to mind.
The other person I would like to honor with a memory was the love of my life who passed last year. My love, after leaving a spouse I married for business purposes and regretted, was the one but was taken from me in a sad way. We were playing at a friend's 6' deep above ground pool and my love jumped out over the water, about two feet above the surface, curled into a cannonball and went in, sank to bottom, hit their right shoulder on the bottom and suffered a C5 burst paralyzing them for life. That life lasted another 30 years with one medical horror story after another. But my lover loved and respected me to the end, and I them. I never remarried and never really had another serious relationship, now I feel too old for that sort of thing. But I do remember the love and respect after a horrible life devoid of that before we met and I will raise a virtual glass to that wonderful person who taught me the value of love and respect.
>>> 
Edited to add: I send you tidings over your family transitions and hope that the better memories are what come to mind first when you are in the remembering frame of mind.
because I omitted a toast to our memories of loved ones!
I hope you are well and that daily life endeavors settle down for you soon.
Best wishes to you. 
-p
Take care my friend.
I am lucky and blessed that I have had family till now. And still do.
I am sure that deep in your psyche something of your mom is still around.
A
to friends and loved ones we miss. K&R!
OS
They are a burden and sometimes a joy for those of us who have extended families.
Things so mixed up these days. Loyalties often are chosen not for family togetherness but but distance in ideology which becomes hurtful.
Sorry for your loss...and thanks for sharing the piecing together of a narrative that brings some of the better into view as you heal.
For two weeks. I was able to put in a total of two hours into my fiction.
