This is a story that, if he were here today, Jordan would probably be exasperated that I'm telling everyone. I mean, it was supposed to be our secret to save us from Mom's wrath.
I don't recall exactly how old we were at the time. I'd estimate Jordan was 11 or 12, and I was 9 or 10. Bre, our sister, would have been two years younger than me. 
Mom had left us for a bit, with Jordan in charge. One thing she didn't consider is that we weren't very good cooks. When we got hungry, Jordan decided we would just pop a frozen pizza in the oven because it seemed easy. It's weird how wrong a simple frozen pizza can go.
I'm not sure why or how, or whether we didn't know how to set the timer on the oven...but we completely forgot the pizza. At some point, we only remembered it was there because the entire house started smelling like a burnt pizza. 
Panicked, Jordan pulled it out of the oven, only to find that the pizza had been reduced to an inedible black disc. I'm not exaggerating. It was completely black.
We assumed that Mom would be mad if she found out we wasted an entire pizza. So Jordan hatched a plan: we would bury the pizza in the back yard. Mom would never know what had happened. 
In retrospect, that seems really silly. But we did it. We buried an entire pizza in the back yard as if we were criminals hiding a body. 
For at least a day or two, it worked. Mom was none the wiser about the missing pizza. We gradually relaxed, thinking she would never find out. 
But of course, these things have a way of coming back to get you. At some point, I remember Mom was standing at our back door, staring out through the glass into our back yard. Our dogs had found something and were sniffing and nibbling at it, and she couldn't figure out what it was. 
I think even wild animals had found the pizza. At any rate, our secret was soon revealed.
I'll just never forget the time I had to hide a shady pizza with a Jordan. 

​
​-Amanda J Tucker

Jordan asked me to come with him to a fishing hole he thought was outstanding on Lake Vermilion. When we got there, he set up the lines and proceeded to show me how.
After several casts and no fish, I begged him to let me try. He reluctantly allowed me and I got a hit. I pulled in a nice walleye.
He said, "Beginner's luck!"
And then he insisted we go to another spot.
-Bob Stevens, Jordan's Grandpa

This is a story that gets told every so often in our family. My Mom would probably roll her eyes at me if she saw me telling it again.
Well, hi, Mom. I'm telling it again, anyway. I don't think any collection of Jordan stories is really complete without this one.
I'm not sure exactly how old we were when it happened. If I had to guess, I suppose I might say maybe I was around seven and Jordan was around nine or ten. 
It was Christmas Eve. Although we weren't a particularly religious family, Mom had the idea to take the lot of us to church for a Christmas Eve service.
One thing I do remember is that the church was absolutely packed. It seemed like just about every seat was taken. Except for the pastor at the front, the massive room full of people was pretty much perfectly silent. 
Of course, it couldn't stay that way for long. Not with someone as tricky as my brother there. 
I don't remember much about the sermon. Like I said, I was a kid. I was hardly paying attention to it. And then suddenly, completely shattering the silence, was the most god awful loud fart I think I've ever heard. 
I felt it rumbling up the pew. I knew, without even having to look at him, that it was Jordan. When I did look at him, however, my suspicion was only confirmed by his smirk.
The pastor stopped mid-sentence. Everyone - and I really do mean everyone - turned to look at us. I have this very distinct memory of a couple hundred pairs of eyes fixed on our small family.
My brother wasn't done, though. Oh, no. That would have been too easy for my mortified Mom.
He took that moment, with everyone's attention on him, to silently point at our stepdad, Mike. No one said a word. Those hundred pairs of eyes turned to poor, innocent Mike and skewered him with their silent judgments. 
It was at that point that I chose to loudly proclaim, "Mom, I felt the pew vibrate!" 
I don't remember what happened after that, really. I'm not sure if we left, or if we toughed out the rest of the sermon with red faces. 
But what I do know is that I'll never forget Jordan's mischievous smirk and how he pointed at Mike. 
-Amanda J Tucker

I saw a story about an eight-year-old boy and his dad on TV yesterday. The program was all about cultivating a good hobby with your child. Anyway, the dad had taught his son how to "catch and release" fish after he caught one.
It was hard for the boy to do, because the fish he had caught was a big walleye. After some consideration of what his dad had taught him, he released the big walleye after stroking its belly to make sure it was okay to swim away.
It brought tears to my eyes because one time, while out fishing with Grandpa, I witnessed Jordan releasing this big walleye and stroking its belly like Grandpa had taught him to. 
I asked him what he was doing, and he very carefully explained. He said she was a female fish and he could feel the eggs in her belly. 
The gentleness he exhibited with the fish was "touching!" 
​-Danielle Stevens, Jordan's Grandma

​It's no secret: I've always struggled with self-confidence.
Depression and anxiety have been my best friends for just about as long as I can remember. I always felt horrible that these burdens weren't only my own to carry - they were my family's. That included Jordan.
I'll never really know exactly how much he knew about my secret struggles with depression, but sometimes, I think it's more than I would ever expect. There were times he would barge into my room randomly, only to turn and leave after seeing I was okay. There were times he would drag me along on what were (to me, anyway) incredibly boring fishing trips in the guise of having an extra person along so he could fish with multiple lines.
But one of the most obvious things he ever did to show how much he cared happened the summer before he passed away. We were down in the living room. I was sitting on the couch and watching him play on the Wii.
I don't remember exactly what he was playing. It may have been Wii Baseball or something. I guess it hardly matters.
Anyway, he was focused on the screen and he made some comment that struck me as cocky. He did that sometimes - pretended to be more confident than I think he was. He had a charming air of bravado he would take up, maybe to make his family (or himself) feel safe.
I said, "You have too big of an ego."
In response, he said, "And yours is too small. But that's okay, you can have some of mine."
I get that it doesn't seem like a lot, especially if you didn't know him like I did. But my brother wasn't one for mushy diatribes and bonding moments. He wasn't the type of guy to sit there and tell me how much he loved me. I simply accepted that he did love me, whether or not he ever told me.
But that day was, I think, the closest he ever came to spelling it out for me. I took it to mean he saw my struggles and my self-loathing, and he cared enough to share his confidence with me if I couldn't have my own confidence.
To this day, I still fight the same inner demons that wear the masks of depression and anxiety. But one of the things that keeps me going is that distant memory of my brother sharing some of his confidence with me. I know, if he could actually transfer a sense of peace and confidence to me, he wouldn't hesitate to do so - even if it meant diminishing his own.
If that isn't love, I don't know what is.
-Amanda J Tucker