Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Sibling Revelry

Siblings are great, I had an older sister for 12 years, and then I met my "twin" and got another sister (who is only 5 days older, so she can't lord it over me... much).

I know my older sister truly enjoyed having a little sis to teach and play with.... I could spell encyclopedia at age 2 and was quite content to go along with any scheme she might concoct. This included airplane rides when we were supposed to be sleeping (that one ended with me getting a dreadfully bloody nose when I sailed over her head into the headboard... again, age 2.), scaring ourselves silly over the "bloody mary" myth when we saw red lights reflected in her mirror (smoke detector test light), and having spelling bees where she tried time and again to remind me that we lived in Hooker County not Hookey Counter (I spelled by memory, not through knowledge until she taught me to read the following year). We also built a treehouse, a fort on top of the container garage in Tanzania, dug a cave in a gully, hunted up buried treasure, taught ourselves to walk barefoot on any terrain and to ride our bikes with no hands. We had competitions to see who could walk the tree branches without falling or holding on (more points the higher you were and the more twisted the branch), and with the arrival of Ashley we would do road trips, have read-a-thons where we did nothign for hours but sit and read books (confused our parents no end... why did we want to be together so much if we were just going to READ), film our own music videos (hilarious footage still available somewhere in Nicole's basement), lip sync, play dress up and Academy, and attempt to teach ourselves to knit (diastrous scarves still available in SOMEONE's garage).

Along the way, we learned how to relate to each other and the world, we learned to balance not just on a tree branch but on the sticky road of life, with all its ups and downs, and we learned that while there will always be someone who lets you down, there is also always a sister... who may hurt or disappoint you on occasion, but will never stop loving or supporting you, no matter what.

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