The only time it is acceptable to use the term “bro.”

If I hear one more douche-bag frat boy call one of their friends, or me when I show up to a party, “bro” I just might lose my mind. I am, in no way, related to those pink polo, backwards visor wearing wastes of space. I am, however, related to the coolest kid since Simon Birch.

My brother of the past 18 years has been a steady point of stress and messed up comparisons over the course of my life. My brother, Rusty, and I have been wrecking shit up on Westridge Road since the early 90’s and there doesn’t seem to be anything to stop us in the near future.

The first time I realized my brother’s awesomeness might be a problem was around age eight. My Uncle Michael had recently purchase us a set of ‘Pillow Sized Boxing Gloves for Christmas’. (You can probably tell where this is going.) We would spare in our front yard for our neighbors because everyone on the block knew we were badass. All was in fun sport until one day all the pillow-stuffing in the gloves had naturally moved away from Rusty’s knuckles and he land a right hook than would have sent a drunk Mike Tyson stumbling. In my case however, I went straight to the ground. And my mother follow in the embarrassment by yelling at my triumph brother and his victim(me) in front of the whole neighborhood.

I have had the unique experience of growing up in race where someone is always coming up behind you. It seems that whenever I try something or become involved in a sport or activity, Rusty has to attempt and pass my accomplishments in a relatively shorter amount of time. The best example of this would be our wrestling careers. When I was in about the seventh grade I became infatuated with the sport of wrestling and my brother soon filed in suit during his sixth grade year. When I was in the eighth grade I lost a close match to Craig Brown in our conference finals and finished second, not to bad. Being himself, Rusty followed with an undefeated season and a monstrous victory in the conference finals. When high school rolled around I had to work and wait my way onto the varsity quad and while I made it my sophomore year, it wasn’t really until my junior year that I really had sometime in the spotlight and captured all-region honors and went to the state tournament. Rusty decided he would make our state-championship squad his freshman year, the only freshman to do so, and eventually win the regional title and have nice big championship bracket to put on his bedroom wall.

Even to this day it’s hard for me to imagine growing up any other way. My brother and I have been blessed with some of the better parenting methods around, but I don’t see how they could prepare for some of the dynamics between us when we were in high school together. Our local newspaper referred to me in the wrestling season preview article as “Rusty’s older brother.” Which really makes it hard to focus on the upcoming match when you’re wondering if the next write-up will read, “125: Rusty O’Connor wins by pin. 152: Rusty’s Older Brother wins by decision.”

To most people it would be a weird feeling to introduce a girl you are courting to your family and have them talk about how attractive your younger brother is for the rest of the night, but by my senior year in high school I was more than used to it. I once had a girl say to me, “if you looked more like your brother you would be the perfect guy.” I wasn’t really sure how to respond to that statement so I said something like “oh, well good looks run in the family,” but it kind of sounded like, “well you can get the hell out of the car you ginger-loving freak.”

It was always really awkward when we would travel to family functions all over the state and my brother’s introduction was along the lines of, “Hey guys its good to see you, this is my girlfriend.” While mine were usually, “uhh hey, you guys know my sister Emily.”

I was never bothered by the dynamic of our sibling rivalry because it was never really competitive. I really enjoy watching my brother succeed in life. This past year when I traveled to watch him win the regional wrestling championship I couldn’t have been prouder of the kid. His success is a direct consequence of his work ethic, which anyone in our family will tell you came from our father. My friends will often ask me if it’s hard to watch your younger brother accomplish what you couldn’t. My answer is always the same, ”no.”

So I will sometimes take the liberty of calling him “bro” because it’s the natural order of things. Since the term “bro” is derived from the longer term “brother,” I don’t see any reason not to use it. Everybody knows I like taking the easier route and why not save a couple of breathes?