Sisters

In my family, I have three younger sisters.  I'm the oldest.  According to the laws of birth order, I guess this means I was preordained to grow up with certain responsibilities.  I cooked, cleaned, and babysat.   I held my little sisters' hands.  I took care of them when my parents couldn't.  I learned when to keep their secrets, and when I was in over my head and needed to get help.

Jacque is two years younger than me...my first little sister.  I think she decided early on that she was going to be my polar opposite.  Some rebellious spark ignited in her little toddler personality.  We were by turns friends and rivals.  She was the Catie to my Jay.

Rhonda was next, and that girl just lived to love Jacque.  Rhonda and Jacque are 18 months apart, and were super close growing up. 

Sunny was the surprise baby who came along two years after Rhonda and made us a foursome.  She usually chose to follow the naughty ones instead of listening to the oldest.  But really, who wouldn't?

Kharli and all the other kids in our family have grown up believing that Jacque and Rhonda are the "cool" ones, and rightly so.  They really are.  I think it comes from being such great friends with each other, and supporting one another all through their lives.  They were in cahoots from day one, and even though I sometimes felt jealous, I'm so glad they had each other to lean on.  

My sisters' antics are legendary.  I'm not just talking about funny little anecdotes.  I'm talking about the kind of legendary stories that find their way into graduation and wedding-day toasts forever after.

When I was 10 those bad girls swiped a $20 bill from my dad's wallet, and decided to do some shopping.  So what do you think an 8 and 7 year old go shopping for?  They took that $20, which was a LOT of money back then, down to the corner store and cashed it in for quarters.  Then they fed those quarters into one of those automated machines that gave out treats in little plastic eggs.

Now, I wasn't there to see it, but to this day I smile when I think of that automated chicken going, "Bwock, bwock, bwock, bwock..BaWooooockkkk!!!"  and spitting out a plastic egg as two naughty little girls giggled....forty times!  Imagine their little hands as they tried to hold all those colorful plastic eggs, stuffing them into pockets, and down shirts, and loading up their arms.  Imagine the look on the store clerk's face as those little girls made a mad dash out the door with their loot, leaving a trail of fallen plastic eggs in their wake.

Did I tell?  No.  They THOUGHT I did, but really my dad was half crazed over losing $20, which was probably a week's grocery money back then.  So when he started turning the house upside down and found 40 plastic eggs in our dresser drawer, he was able to put two and two together without any help from me. 

As they got older, my sisters gained a bit of notoriety by invading grocery stores and playing pranks.  One of their favorite things to do was hide and "talk" to strangers.  They'd hide behind the cereal boxes and call out to shoppers, "Buuuuyyyyy meeee...."  "No, wait....buuuyyyy MEEEEE!"

Or they would hide behind the giant packages of diapers in the baby aisle and when some unsuspecting mom came along they'd make crying sounds.  Can you imagine being a tired new mommy, searching your purse for that diaper coupon and all of a sudden that super pack of Huggies begins to tremble and cry softly?

Then there was the time they took pushpins and ever so sneakily walked up and down the soda aisle.  All those 2-liters!!  Poke, poke, poke, poke.  If you are a sweeper in a grocery store and you round the corner and an entire aisle of 2-liter bottles have all become fountains spraying into the air and all over the floor....well what do you DO?  Seriously.  That sight would probably immobilize me with my fingers tangled in my hair and my jaw dropped in horror.

Anyhow, my sisters were banned from the grocery stores in our area forever after that.  I wouldn't be surprised if their pictures were posted "Wanted" style by all the cash registers.  They DID have the last laugh, though.  After being banned, they still made the occasional appearance for old time's sake.   This time the did it by bicycle!  They would get a really good running start and then speed in through the open door on their bikes, crazily pumping their little legs like twin bats out of hell, and then race back out again, usually with some poor grocery shmuck in hot pursuit.

Throughout all this, I was the older, responsible sister.  Being the oldest might seem great to some.  You get to stay up later, get to do things earlier.  You drive first, date first, get a job first, graduate first.  You are bestowed with a certain amount of trust by your parents and you are looked up to by your little sisters.  The best of worlds, you might think.  And it was...sometimes.  Mostly, though, it left me in the position of mothering my siblings when I really just wanted to be their friend.

But when you are the oldest, well.. you can give advice and share your stuff, and be there when they need help getting out of a jam.  But getting INTO those jams?  Well, nobody invites the oldest to the "Ways to Get Into Trouble" meetings. My invitation to those little soirees was usually lost in the mail. 

They loved me.  I know they did and I knew it then, too.  I always had a friend to talk to, a shoulder to lean on.  I never felt left out of the sister bond.  But still...we all grew up with it being known that I was not the cool one.  Not the fun one.  They thought I was smart and good, and someone they could turn to.  But they also believed they were taking their chances whenever they did. 

The truth is, they had no idea how much I admired their ingenious plots! I thought they were brave and spirited and hilarious.  I still do.  They are the bravest, most spirited women I know and I love who they are.

I always say that my sisters are my best friends.  Even when our lives are hectic and we don't see each other enough, I think of them.  I think about what wonderful women those little girls grew up to be.  I'm so proud of them, and I'd like to believe that I had a small part in that, whether it was waking them up for school, making their dinner, helping them with their homework, or giving them boyfriend advice.

And as much as I truly did miss all the clucking eggs over the years, it was worth it.