My brother passed away last night

I'm probably still in shock. Hoping I manage to stay glued together despite the way things might go over the next few days.
I have hope that Cathy, my sister in law, can be strong and that we can get through this without too much panic.

My brother passed away last night, either sometime over the night or very early in the morning of April 2nd.

Cathy found him dead in the bathroom at 1:00 am this morning when she got home from work
The coroner is doing an autopsy but it's likely a heart attack or stroke that killed him.

What a shocker! I can't believe my brother is gone - my gosh! My big brother, Willie!
As youngsters we were close. As teens we slipped apart a bit, but that's always true with an older brother too I guess.
After my daughter was born we became close again and over the years she was growing up my brother and I became very close and I'm going to miss him. He looked out for me when he could and I looked out for him the same - we cared and were family and that's what mattered the most to both of us. There's nothing more important than blood connections, in our family it made no difference who you were or what you did - what was important was that you were family. And now we're one shy... Oh gee! What a bizarre feeling it is.

My parents may take this fairly hard. (they're in their 70's) I have hope we'll get through these next few days fairly smoothly, without too much panic and heartache - at least not more than expected. How does a parent bury their child? Their children are supposed to bury them. Parents don't want to witness the death of their offspring. It's just not the way it's supposed to be. My mom's in a bit of shock too I think!

And my brother still didn't even have as much gray hair as I do - he teased me always about that - him being older and having fewer gray hairs than me! And of course he always reminded me that he was the older one and that I looked like him not that he looked like me! Seeing that he was born first...

I'll know more later today but it seems nature threw out a cruel April Fools' joke - My brother, dead on April Fools Day. At least as best we can tell it looks like that's when he died! When I learn more - I'll add to this, there are some funny details that I'll save for a day or two from now once the shock has worn off a little. I know my brother would be happy to have the story told. The man he was, it would be a comedic legacy he'd be happy to share with the world.

I was supposed to start work today - my first day on a new job. I called them first thing - though I wasn't starting until 2:00 pm, just for orientation. They're fine at work, thank goodness, and told me to just keep in touch, I'll be able to start as soon as I feel ready. Today John and I will take my parents up to see my sister in law and see how we'll be able to help her. Find out what she plans on doing and how she wants to handle things. This could be a stress filled day, no one's ever prepared for death though it's something that can hit any day, any time. It's hard to really plan for except when someone is deathly ill or very old, family members and their being there are things we all just take for granted. We had planned we'd see each other this Easter weekend, we were just there visiting last weekend and planned to go up for dinner on Easter Sunday. I was going to bring him some of the extra strawberry plants from my garden. Plants I got from him just 4 years ago!