Having a baby sister has its pros and cons…I see this even more clearly now that I have my own children. The youngest gets cut a lot of slack, but they also get the most hand-me-downs. My baby sister came along a little over a year after I was born, so of course our parents thought we’d be fast friends from day one. In reality, I don’t remember a time without her there. I have early memories of looking out of my crib and seeing that adorable sleeping baby in the crib across the room. Actually, I don’t recall thinking anything, all I have in my brain is a picture of her…so my adult self thinks, “beautiful baby” whereas I was probably thinking some baby version of INTERLOPER! I could see that she was the baby, not me, so I figured out how to stick my hand down to the latch and drop the side of my crib. My mother would usually find me curled up under my crib with my baby blanket, but once she found me in the crib with my sister sleeping on top of her.
One time, a few years later, I awoke from a nightmare about an episode of Lost in Space where a green lady was mesmerizing Dr. Smith into giving her their fuel, which was her own sustenance. She had a sultry voice calling out to him seductively, “Dr. Smi-ith!” and he’d come to her, madly enthralled. I was scared to death of that lady! I awoke in the dark and popped out of bed and opened the door…I intended to cross the hall to my parents room to let them know I had a nightmare and needed some comforting. Instead, when I opened the door, there she was! She was lying on the floor between my door and my parents’ in all her shiny greenness. Then my sister woke up too and she saw the green lady too! We still don’t know how this twin nightmare happened, but young as we were we still remember it.
My sister and I were swimming at a very young age and I still remember her taking the test to swim in the Olympic-sized pool at the local recreation center. She was about 6 years old and looked younger. At first she’d get called out of the pool all the time because the life guards couldn’t believe she was allowed in the “big” pool and wanted to send her back to the “middle” pool (although, not all the way back to the “baby” pool!). I was sometimes asked to verify her “big” pool status. But, then she started diving and no one asked about her swimming ability again. I enjoyed watching her dive…she was fearless until she hit her head on the board one day and gave up diving.
When she was in middle school I remember her singing on stage and was again amazed at her self-confidence, not to mention her amazing voice. I don’t recall her doing any performing after that, but she seemed to channel all her outgoingness into friend-making. Once we were both in high school, her friends were around so much that they became my friends too. Nice to have a sister like that! (I always wanted a twin brother, for similar, but not similar reasons…but I digress). We even graduated in the same calendar year because she finished a semester early, but she still lays claim to her own graduating class a year after mine.
After that, we both felt compelled to move away from our hometown…one to the northeast, one to the west. An additional move for each of us and we are now many miles apart. That has meant not seeing one another as often as we’d like, but we are trying to make up for it now that vacation days are a bit more numerous. I wish I were there in person today to say to her:
Happy Birthday, Sis! Find the Joy in the Journey!
Related Post: Ode to My Big Sister
Laura's Adventures After 50! 