Today, Paul Holmgren penned a piece for The Players’ Tribune about his brother, Dave, a diabetic, who died when he was 23:

When I was 13 or 14, Dave wanted to go downtown to buy tickets to a concert. This was in the days before it became the law to provide access for the handicapped to public transportation. Dave needed to take a city bus to get to the box office, but he wasn’t allowed to take his guide dog, Prudy, on the bus. So he asked me to accompany him instead.

I probably didn’t want to go, but I did anyway. When the bus pulled up at the stop a few blocks from our house and the doors opened, I said to Dave, “Do you want me to go?”

What I meant was, “Do you want me to go first up the steps?” That way, I would be able to help him board. But I think because of my attitude, he took it the wrong way. He said something like, “If you don’t want to go, I’ll go myself.”

We rode the bus together in silence. I never explained to him what I had actually meant — and I have carried that around with me ever since. I know that it may sound like something small, but it stuck with me because I felt I had let him down. He was a rock, and he had always been there for me. In his time of weakness, he had asked a simple thing of me … and I took him for granted.

Dammit, Paul. I can’t even muster up a Bryzgalov dig. Well done.

You can read the full thing here.