"I Think You've Got My Chair"

When I was very small, my sister loved me so much. She always wanted to kiss my chubby cheeks. She would say, "Come sit on me," and lay on her back with her knees bent, like a little chair just for me. I sat in my Amy chair and she would tell me "secrets" and we laughed and laughed. Frequently, her secrets were more like requests: "Go ask Mom and Dad if we can go to 7-11 to get some candy...BUT," she always added, "Don't say, 'Amy wants to know.'"

She was always happy to play with me...unless she had a friend over, or unless I wanted to play with her precious Cabbage Patch Preemie, Hugh with the cute little pacifier.  Here and there, she had to draw the line. I accepted this as a younger sibling.

We played games, like M.A.S.H. (Mansion, Apartment, Shack, House) where we guessed about how our lives would turn out. It was pretty much an eeny-meeny-miney-mo game that depended on your selection of a number and where the pencil would land on the list of possibilities. What kind of car will you drive? What kind of house will you have? Who will you marry? How many kids will you have? Will you be rich or poor?

"LeeAnn, you will drive an Oldsmobile, live in a shack, marry Joe, have 6 kids and be a millionaire."

We loved make-believe. We were usually teachers or secretaries. My favorite was secretary because Mom let us use the disconnected rotary-dial phone. I loved that clickity-click sound. We set up card tables, gathered up all of our mom's old magazines, and turned through the pages looking for those little card inserts. We'd rip them out and fill them out for our customers on the phone: "Hello? Yes, that will be fine....Mmhmm, yes, yes...Can you hold on, please?"

When she started getting older, the boundary line got further and further away until I was reduced to listening in on her phone conversations and sneeking into her room when she wasn't home. I became her little taddle tale. I recall feeling rejected, insignificant, and a little lonely. Sure, I had my own friends, but I missed my sister, and she was becoming more and more hostile as teenagers do. She no longer wanted to tell me secrets or even make requests.

When I entered into the teenage years myself, she let me back into her world. I felt so cool. I felt like she was proud of me again. Instead of hiding me away from her friends, giving me the enemy soldier treatment, she was letting me ride in her car, telling me things about her life and letting me hang out with her and her friends. She was a very cool sister.

We remained best friends for many years. She got married and moved out of our house, which, as it turned out, wasn't such a sad thing because I could go visit her and spend the night even! It opened a new chapter in my life as well, as I started pushing the limits on my "best" behavior.

Now that we are adults in "the real world," we both have busy lives with our families. I miss that sister sharing and friendship. I know we'll always love each other, but some where along the way, communication has lost its effectiveness. We have a very hard time relating to each other these days despite all of the things we have in common. It breaks my heart.  Even the most benign exchange can turn ugly faster than you can say, "eeny-meeny-miney-mo." Whether it's too many words or not enough words, I'm not sure.

"My words are nearly always an offense.
I don't know how to speak of anything
So as to please you. But I might be taught,
I should suppose. I can't say I see how."

"We could have some arrangement
By which I'd bind myself to keep hands off
Anything special you're a-mind to name.
Though I don't like such things 'twixt those that love."

--Robert Frost, from "Home Burial"

Our friendship has been put on the shelf like an old book gathering dust. I'm afraid that too much time will pass and the book's pages will be too brittle to handle.

If I die tomorrow, one of my biggest life regrets will be that I turned my back on our friendship. If I could fix it right now, I would. It's just that my key won't open the door. Maybe Father Time will turn the page and open the door for us...bring these sisters back together as he has in the past...