(The Swamp) - My column is late, this week. I have just gotten back from Athens, Georgia, visiting with my brother, who is dying.

To say that he is too young to die is an understatement of the cruelest kind. Nevertheless, at 66, he has traveled the world, sung with the best Boys choir in the world, at that time, got a Doctorate and taught in England, fought for our country, became a spy for the Air Force Secret Service, loved ladies who always spoke well of him, afterwards, and married a few. Orin Anderson was a genuine hero to persons of an age gone by.

And like the life he lived, never knowing when the next turn would create certitude, at least he had crack at it.

Being the first born of a Scots-Huguenot family, James Orin was named for his two Grandfathers - James Abijah Richebourg Anderson and Orin Faison Crow - both pioneers of a sort. Little Bijie's life was more like Huck Finn - he ran away from two maiden aunts in Laurens, had amazing adventures, and wound up married to a Scottish lady who gave him 13 Georgia children, 12 of whom lived. Orin Crow was the Dean of Education at USC, who ventured to show that education did not have to be beaten into a student - which is the correct translation of emollit mores nec sinit esse feros - and he would know that because he was one of the last true Latin scholars. Orin had both personalities.

Life seemed to come easily to Orin. When he was ready to walk through a door, the door appeared. In an ontological sense, he wasn't better than anyone else, but in a practical sense, things always turned out OK. He continues this confounding of nature at his passing. The doctors don't have a clue why he's sick, other than that he was exposed several times to barrels and barrels of "agent orange."

But there was one thing that Orin DID do better than anyone else I know or have known - he could entertain anyone, anywhere. He'd whip out a guitar (tenor, of course) and sing a ditty of some kind to the delight of anyone watching. Even when he didn't have his guitar, he could sing a song which was worth stopping and listening to. As he grew weaker over the years, and his voice finally gave way, he could still tell a funny story or give a remark with a twinkle in his eye.

To say he had no children is not true. Technically, he had no issue, a fact that the world will regret in some generation. But his adopted family knows full well that he is their progenitor. They love their Poppy and they already cry for his soon-to-be absence.

As for me, I will miss him because he was my big brother. I idolized him and tried to be like him. This exercise in futility has made me a better person - forced me to be a better writer, a better teacher, a better actor, a better "TV guy."

Looking back at all the history, the only thing I can fault him for will be the fact that he went before I did. Now, there is only Mom and I. Dad's gone. Innis's gone. All that is left is the knowledge that the candle has burned so quickly because it has burned so brightly.

(Orin died about two weeks later, peacefully, in his sleep. The Doctors still don't know what killed him.)

- Dick Anderson