My brother Pete was the most lavish and outbound person I’ve ever known. He made networks everywhere he went. You could talk to him for five minutes and leave feeling like you’d known him repeatedly. And even if you hadn’t seen him in a day, you could call him and ask for help and he’d be there, no queries asked.
He just loved people. It always made me fun a little, because I’m more withdrawn and perfectly fine being alone. But Pete flourished around others. He was the one person I could always total on. He stood by me when I met my partner and was the best man at our wedding. If we had done godparents, he would’ve been the one for my son. We were that close. People even believed we were twins occasionally.
Courtesy of Emily Iafrate
I miss him each single day. And while I was his only organic sibling, there are hundreds of people who feel like they lost a brother too. Pete made everyone feel loved. He said “I love you” frequently, hugged all and one, and was just warm like that.
He operated in the diner and bar manufacturing his entire adult lifetime, in Michigan and Florida. He loved the job and people he was working with, he found the environment very diverse. He also knew how hard that life might be. He titled his fellow servers and bartenders really well, often 40–50%, and sometimes 100% when he really liked someone.
Courtesy of Emily Iafrate
Back in March, he evaded medical care for an ear contagion due to not having cover. He already owed $35,000 from a assume surgery the year before and didn’t want to add more debt. One night, his colleagues heard him making odd sounds. They hurried him to the ER, and within hours, he was sedated and on a fan. The next day, we found out he had no brain action. The infection had spread to his brainstem. That night, his body may have been shutting down from sepsis. It all occurred so suddenly.
People originated to the infirmary to say goodbye, dividing stories and reminiscences. It was clear how loved he was.
Courtesy of Emily Iafrate
A few weeks after he passed, we found some cash in his bank explanation. We didn’t want it. So my mom started mailing checks to Pete’s friends who were out of work during the pandemic. She started with, “You can call this the last thing from Pete, big plump tip.”
That led to the start of our nonprofit, put on Pete’s Tab. We help people in the service industry who are struggling. We’ve made a change for many families, giving out thousands in aid along the way. There’s also a movement of people leaving huge tips in his name using the hashtag. It started with a foreigner and spread across the republic.
Courtesy of Emily Iafrate
At first, I wished people knew we were behindhand it. But then I thought of Pete. This is exactly what he would’ve wanted people serving people, quietly, kindly, and from the heart.
