Sisters
This is Chick after a day romping with her sister Lulu through swamp water (mud) and tick infested bushes. I know they're tick infested because my friend Chelsea tells me so (Lulu is Chelsea's dog which she got from the same litter of puppies that I got Chick from) and also because Chelsea found one on my neck. I'm going to have nightmares about this for years.
This is Lulu who is about five times as energetic as Chick and the biggest love-bug on the planet. She's gorgeous, sleek, and has a super strong super whippy tail that turns like a fast fan on a hot summer day when she's excited. Which is most of the time.
Clash of the titans: it can be a little intimidating watching Chick and Lulu wrestle because they bare their teeth like wild beasts. They are both densely muscled and formiddable opponents. I wouldn't want to meet either of them on a dark empty street. Unless I had a pig-ear-type-disgusting treat which would render them senselessly joyful and not at all scary pit-bull terrors.
Even though they fought like gladiators for three hours, they had much affection to share. Lulu is the one with the purple collar.Having mentioned my sister in the last post I have found myself thinking about sisters. About my sister and me. About other people and their sisters. I wonder a lot about other people's relationships with their sisters, how different they might be from the one I have with mine. It amazes me constantly how different I am than Tara. How we came from the same uterus, the same early childhood (before our parents seperated and she lived with my dad), and have the same family, yet can see everything from completely different perspectives.
Anytime I discuss sisterhood it seems important to mention that I was rotten to my sister when we were little. A lot of it was because my mother babied her (kind of still does actually though both of them would fiercely deny it, I'm sure) and used to scold me for saying mean things to "her little masterpiece". I hated the fact that she got different treatment than me and my brother. She's also five years younger than me so the age gap made it difficult for me to relate to her. All she wanted was to play with me and my brother. My brother didn't have time for any of us. If he could have moved out and gotten his own apartment at ten years of age, he certainly would have.
There is so much inequity in our family dynamics. Or, at least, most of us feel that we alone have endured injuries and challenges that none of our other family members have gone through, when in fact we have all pretty much gone through the same experiences-together. If my sister felt caught between my parents through the years, so have I. If my brother felt short shrifted by family events, so has my sister. All of us have experienced so much of the same things, yet each of us has become accustomed to thinking that we have experienced them alone.
Which makes it difficult to bond with each other in an honest way. But over the years I have come to appreciate my sister for the gorgeous, sarcastic, sleepy, strong, and funny person she is. We are so incredibly different in the choices we make, the goals we set for ourselves, and our way of looking at the world. Which makes it interesting to watch her grow, mature, and achieve things in her life. How I see her is distinctly different from how she sees herself. And when I get glimpses of how she sees me through the expectations she has of me and the things she says about me in the context of our family, I can't help but feel sure that how she sees me is also very different from how I see myself.
To be honest, I actually don't know who any of my family members think I am. They give very few clues. Historically I have felt very invisible to them. To a certain extent, I still do. Most of my family never even knew I spent most of my teens depressed and on the verge of suicide. Which means I was wearing the most amazing cloaking device ever (because all the death-rock stuff was certainly reflective of my inner landscape and pretty much out there for all the world to see). It still amazes me how I could have a serious nervous breakdown right in front of my family and no one batted an eyelash. I don't think such a thing would happen now. Yet I still feel a certain amount of invisibility in my family context. Which is funny since I'm the loudest most obvious person of us all.
Another thing that seriously impresses me is how both my sister and I have turned out to be so much like our mother, but in different ways. Something I never saw coming. It isn't a bad thing actually because my mother has many excellent qualities and I would never be ashamed to be like her, but still, one doesn't generally expect to turn out like their mom, that's something that happens to other people.
It wasn't until I left home that I started to appreciate my sister. She's a pretty amazing person, though she's as prickly as a desert cactus about more subjects than I could list here. Sometimes conversations can be like walking a mine-field. Then there are times when we can really laugh about things and share our thoughts on things and somehow I feel like she's one of my closest friends.
I'm very proud to have Tara as my sister and I've tried to tell her that repeatedly over the years so she never forgets that I'm happy to be her big sister.
How I would describe my sister: (don't be mad Tara, I couldn't resist!)
beautiful, hard as petrified amber, vulnerable, nurturing, sweet, thoughtful, contradictory, uncomfortable in her own skin, critical, funny, strong, adventurous, prickly, surprising, smart, childish, experienced, unsure, angry, scared, thin, attractive, urban, well read, opinionated, well educated, chic, feminine, uncomfortable with femininity, retreating, tightly wound, restless, and creative.
Holy hell, I have to go to work now. This is the big day. Wish me luck!
Anytime I discuss sisterhood it seems important to mention that I was rotten to my sister when we were little. A lot of it was because my mother babied her (kind of still does actually though both of them would fiercely deny it, I'm sure) and used to scold me for saying mean things to "her little masterpiece". I hated the fact that she got different treatment than me and my brother. She's also five years younger than me so the age gap made it difficult for me to relate to her. All she wanted was to play with me and my brother. My brother didn't have time for any of us. If he could have moved out and gotten his own apartment at ten years of age, he certainly would have.
There is so much inequity in our family dynamics. Or, at least, most of us feel that we alone have endured injuries and challenges that none of our other family members have gone through, when in fact we have all pretty much gone through the same experiences-together. If my sister felt caught between my parents through the years, so have I. If my brother felt short shrifted by family events, so has my sister. All of us have experienced so much of the same things, yet each of us has become accustomed to thinking that we have experienced them alone.
Which makes it difficult to bond with each other in an honest way. But over the years I have come to appreciate my sister for the gorgeous, sarcastic, sleepy, strong, and funny person she is. We are so incredibly different in the choices we make, the goals we set for ourselves, and our way of looking at the world. Which makes it interesting to watch her grow, mature, and achieve things in her life. How I see her is distinctly different from how she sees herself. And when I get glimpses of how she sees me through the expectations she has of me and the things she says about me in the context of our family, I can't help but feel sure that how she sees me is also very different from how I see myself.
To be honest, I actually don't know who any of my family members think I am. They give very few clues. Historically I have felt very invisible to them. To a certain extent, I still do. Most of my family never even knew I spent most of my teens depressed and on the verge of suicide. Which means I was wearing the most amazing cloaking device ever (because all the death-rock stuff was certainly reflective of my inner landscape and pretty much out there for all the world to see). It still amazes me how I could have a serious nervous breakdown right in front of my family and no one batted an eyelash. I don't think such a thing would happen now. Yet I still feel a certain amount of invisibility in my family context. Which is funny since I'm the loudest most obvious person of us all.
Another thing that seriously impresses me is how both my sister and I have turned out to be so much like our mother, but in different ways. Something I never saw coming. It isn't a bad thing actually because my mother has many excellent qualities and I would never be ashamed to be like her, but still, one doesn't generally expect to turn out like their mom, that's something that happens to other people.
It wasn't until I left home that I started to appreciate my sister. She's a pretty amazing person, though she's as prickly as a desert cactus about more subjects than I could list here. Sometimes conversations can be like walking a mine-field. Then there are times when we can really laugh about things and share our thoughts on things and somehow I feel like she's one of my closest friends.
I'm very proud to have Tara as my sister and I've tried to tell her that repeatedly over the years so she never forgets that I'm happy to be her big sister.
How I would describe my sister: (don't be mad Tara, I couldn't resist!)
beautiful, hard as petrified amber, vulnerable, nurturing, sweet, thoughtful, contradictory, uncomfortable in her own skin, critical, funny, strong, adventurous, prickly, surprising, smart, childish, experienced, unsure, angry, scared, thin, attractive, urban, well read, opinionated, well educated, chic, feminine, uncomfortable with femininity, retreating, tightly wound, restless, and creative.
Holy hell, I have to go to work now. This is the big day. Wish me luck!