The Good Sister (aged 6) & The Baby (me)
My sister… the good sister… is coming to visit next week. This is an unprecedented event.
Several times a year since coming to my graduation (in 1997!) the good sister has commented to me “I’m going to try to come visit you in Oregon this year.” But never has. I’ve flown out *many* times to visit her – about every other year or so. While I was still in college she got married, then started having kids, and the whole family moved out to Tennessee, so it’s always just been easier for me to do the traveling. So let me repeat – this is an unprecedented event.
The two of us had a fairly normal relationship as kids (normal in that we fought near-constantly). As adults we've gotten along relatively well. You know - in 15 minute phone calls and bi-annual visits. I'm still 'the baby' though... and there's more than a little sibling rivalry. She's got the fantastic marriage & beautiful kids, but I have a lot more expendable cash than she does. You know... the grass is always greener.
I’ve got some plans as to what to do while she’s here – show her off to my office, take her downtown – to Saturday Market, go out to a McMenamins… all those kinds of Portlandy things. So I think I've got activities covered... but she'll be staying with me in my tiny one bedroom apartment and that'll make for a fair amount of one-on-one time. Time for her to give me tons of unsolicited advice and ask me invasive questions about my (lack of) personal life. This is after all the woman who once gave me a card on our birthday that said "You may be younger than I... but at least I was married by your age."
Yeah... this is gonna be great.
6 comments:
It will fly by, trust me. Hm, but there's about the same gap between me and my sister and similar situations--I hope I don't come off as giving her a bunch of unsoliticted advice!
You'll have fun!
I can so relate . . . I've lived in Portland since 1992, and my parents have come to visit me once. (I'm an only child, so I don't have the sister thing). And yes, I'm the one who goes out once a year or once every few years to visit . . . there are good reasons why this dynamic exists, and my dad passed away a few years ago - so now, I'm trying to imagine my mom coming to visit and spending a week at my house . . . and I get equally frightened! Perhaps this is why she doesn't come to visit? Hmmmm . . .
bezzie - yeah it should be fine. Oh, and if you'd given unsolicited advice, I'm sure you would have heard about it.
bridget - it's just a weird thing interacting with family as an adult & on your own turf. Kinda challenges all the old family dynamics.
Are you the Bad sister? The Evil sister? Discuss.
The eldest is The Bad Sister... we speak not her name.
The middle is The Good Sister.
I am, and forever will be, The Baby.
My brother, who is and forever will be seven years OLDER than me, once came to visit me all by himself as an extension of a business trip. No wife, no kids. Just him and me. It was weird and great and I learned he doesn't like peanut butter in anything (cookies, sauces, dips, etc.) I'd had no idea.
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