Six months ago now. November 15th, 2024. My brother—James Troy Boggs. It has taken me this long to sit down and quietly face it. Jimmy was just 67. My little brother. He had a number of health issues and had been under hospice care. In the end, it was lung cancer. He and his wife Sharon lived in Oklahoma.

Of course, Jimmy’s early years were the same dysfunctional mess as mine were. In Adult Children of Alcoholic terms, Jimmy was definitely the family “scapegoat.” 

According to journeytojoycounseling.com, “The family scapegoat is the problem child, also known as the ‘troublemaker.’ They are risk-takers, independent, and always into something. They rebel against the family system. They may be angry, withdrawn, and oppositional. They may get pregnant, get into drugs, or fail out of school. Scapegoats are considered to be the ‘screw up.’ Scapegoats feel alone, and don’t know where they fit in the family. As adults, they may continue to make self-destructive choices and struggle with intimacy of any kind.”

Jimmy’s life reflected many of those traits.

Jimmy was only four when our parents divorced and our father completely vanished from our lives. Still, our father’s alcoholism and subsequent abandonment of our family had a deep impact on Jimmy, me, and our sister Cindy. Yet from my perspective, Jim’s many troubles through his life may have had their origin when he and I were toddlers.

We had a strange grandmother on our father’s side. Though I was just a year and a half older than Jimmy, as little boys we got treated very differently. Our hair for example. My grandmother insisted on letting my blond hair grow. She liked that it was curly on top. She saw to it that Jimmy always had a buzz cut. I can guess that she was motivated to prefer me because I was named after her son my father, William Norman Boggs (clearly her “baby”). Even then, I noticed her weird treatment of us though I was barely six years old. There were other peculiar and even evil instances from her as well. And this wasn’t the only time Jim’s hair became an issue. I’ll get to that.

I believe Jimmy actually wandered down our father’s well-worn path to destruction. He repeated some of our father’s mistakes as have I, but different ones. Sadly, some of Jim’s lifestyle choices surely contributed to his early death. There was anger, rebellion, violence, some trouble with the law in the past, alcohol, and drugs. On top of all that, he was seriously hurt at work some years ago, affecting him physically.

As little boys, we got along pretty well. We were brothers after all, and brothers close in age. Fights were common and we both have brotherly scars to prove it. I clearly remember a fight when I was 12 and Jim was 11. Our family had moved in with our gracious maternal grandparents in Northwest Indiana. Jimmy and I were going at it pretty fiercely in our backyard. I have no idea why (maybe it was because he forgot to put oil in our minibike, that sure didn’t turn out well). Anyway, Jim decided to arm himself, and grabbed his sword of choice. Well, uh, it was an actually broom with a very hard wooden handle. He was angry and swinging that thing like Darth Vader’s lightsaber. Nearing the crescendo, he moved closer to me and swung with force.

I was quick, deflecting the blow downward with my arm and yanking the broom right out of his hands. At that very precise moment, our grandmother, hearing the commotion outside, came out the backdoor to see just what kind of street fight was going on. What she saw was me holding the broom in the air, freshly pulled from Jimmy’s paws. She thought I was the one wielding the sword, not Jimmy. I got in trouble for hitting Jimmy with that broom, even though I didn’t do it (that time). I tried to explain and Jimmy wasn’t helping. I remember laughing at the situation a little while later. After all, I regularly got some preferential treatment from our gracious grandmother on our mother’s side because I never (well, not that often) got in trouble. Jimmy did constantly.

A few years later, junior high. The second buzz cut story. Jim evidently had a dislike of going to school. Lots of truancy. Our grandfather tried to deal with that by giving Jimmy a buzz haircut even a Marine drill instructor would love. Now, Jim’s very long early 1970’s hair was his pride. He spent lots of time in the bathroom daily getting his long locks just so. He was hurt deeply by this unusual punishment. Our Papaw, a flawed man but very good to us, saw Jimmy’s pain and felt badly about what he had just done. Amazingly, Papaw headed out to buy Jimmy a wig to wear to school. Crazy! But Jimmy chose to wear that piled-on peruke. On the bus to school, another boy pulled the wig off Jim’s almost bare head. A big fight ensued, and Jimmy was suspended.  

Things got more serious. Jimmy was considered to be a good-looking kid and always had girls around. One of those girlfriends told him no one was home at her house over lunch. She couldn’t be there but she gave him a key. Jim went in to make a sandwich. Odd? Yes. Evidently, her father returned home to find a strange kid in his house eating his food. He had no knowledge of his daughter’s invitation. Her father pressed charges. That plus several truancy episodes got him sentenced to Indiana Boys School. Reform school it was. 

Jim never went to traditional high school. He got a GED in the Boys School. His grades there were nothing short of excellent. Jimmy was not a stupid guy. 

Some time passed and I joined the Marines. While on leave one December, my mother and I visited Jimmy at the Boys School. They put Mom and me in a room and went to get Jimmy. What we saw next was sadly inconceivable. They brought Jim to us in handcuffs and leg shackles. Leg shackles? For truancy? His offenses were minor. Maybe if we could have afforded a lawyer, Jimmy may not have been there at all. My budding sense of justice got a big booster shot that day. What I saw was so unfair, so cruel. 

After Jim was released, he joined my mom in her apartment. I came home on leave again, this time as a surprise. I got home before dawn. I was in my Marine Corps dress greens uniform. I went into my bedroom, now our bedroom. Still dark. I made enough noise to wake up Jimmy. He saw a silhouette of what looked to him like a police officer. He flew out of his bed in over-the-top fight-or-flight mode. He was attacking me, the imagined cop. I flipped on the light and he calmed down. Whew! Welcome home to me! I still wonder what created his bizarre fear of the police. Maybe he remembered the leg shackles, but it was probably something fresher.

As it got light outside, I went out to see my pride and joy…a red 1967 Volkswagen Beetle. I left it for my mom to use while I was away in the Marines. My heart sank as I saw my bug. In high school, I bought it with my own money and nearly waxed the paint off it. I loved my bug. Now, it was a banged up mess. Dents, broken glass, and filthy. My mom had let Jimmy use it. It was trashed. He said he was followed by another car one night. He got out to face the guys in that car. They beat him up and trashed my beloved little car. I forgave Jimmy.  But I still miss that car.

James Troy Boggs had a very tough life. There are some bright spots though. Along the way, Jimmy and his wife had four great kids. It looks to me like the kids have broken the dark chain linked to our father. A very great blessing.

Later, Jim found God through an Oklahoma preacher. I was very happy about that.

As I think about my brother, I am humbled and somewhat sad. After becoming adults with so little in common, he and I stayed very distant. Mostly my fault but he knew my phone number too. Our life paths couldn’t have been more dissimilar. I learned this phenomenon may well be related to my own Adult Children of Alcoholics role. As the family “hero” I colored within the family lines and tried to do what was right. But as soon as I could, I got far, far away from home and any source of past remembrances. When I got together with my brother and sister, when I saw their struggles, I somehow felt like it was my fault. Of course it wasn’t. We did get together a few times. Though I always left feeling guilty, I found Jim and sister Cindy to be gracious, unpretentious, and wondering why I was such a distant big brother. I wasn’t in touch then with the “why” on that one. Even today, I believe I failed them as their big brother and as an uncle to my nieces and nephews. I’m glad I had the chance to affirm both Jim and Cindy, expressing face-to-face my feelings toward them.

In July 2023, Patty and I got to visit Jim and his wife Sharon at their home in Oklahoma. Jimmy was obviously very sick but still gracious and very glad to see his big brother. There were tears, no surprise. I am so glad we made that trip. 

Just a couple of years earlier, I was at the hospital bedside of my little sister, even younger than Jimmy. Like Jim, Cindy also had a rough early life. She died in April, 2022. I was honored to conduct her funeral.

I lost both my parents almost 50 years ago. And over the last two years or so, I have lost my only sister and my only brother. I am the oldest child of my parents so it’s a bit surprising, strange, and somewhat unsettling to be the one still on this Earth. It seems a little wrong in some ways. But I’m very thankful. Only by the grace of God am I still here. While I am absolutely alone now in regard to my family of origin, I am certainly not alone in my life. Of course God is with me always. And I have a wife, four kids and their spouses, 14 grandchildren, and one great-grandson due to arrive in August. And also some special cousins and a few friends. I am very well-loved. These days. I’m trying to stay closely connected to all of them as best I can and love them with reckless abandon. I’ve concluded I must have work still to do and contributions to make to my family and this world. I am exceedingly grateful to still be here and I’ll keep looking for ways to express it. Still, I miss my brother and sister. And my mother. Yes, I am truly an orphan, but one who was adopted by God my Heavenly Father.

I love you, James Troy Boggs. You too, Cynthia Louise Boggs. I will see you in Heaven.