In just a few short days I will celebrate my birthday and two days later my sister will celebrate hers. Although we are two years and two days apart in age we were treated like we were twins. Strange you may say....frugal my mother would say.
Just think. If you could combine two birthday parties into one, shop for the same thing, just in a different colour - it makes perfect sense. You save time and money. And why stop at birthdays? You can keep it up for all special occasions. Being the youngest of seventeen cousins on my mother's side and adding the "exhaustion" factor, it made it a whole lot easier on aunts who had to manage all of this gift-buying.
And we did look an awful lot alike. Mom was very good at giving us identical "boy-short" haircuts and we were both blond and pale. I can see how you could forget that we were actually two years apart and not "twins". In all family functions we were "foisted" upon each other, having no other younger children to play with. Only when we were with our other cousins on my dad's side did we have cousins our own age to play with. Unfortunately, they lived far away and we only got together with them rarely.
Not that I am complaining (well maybe a little). Looking back on my childhood I realize how important that relationship was with my sister. We were the best of friends and the worst of enemies. We could easily play contentedly for hours only to break out into a brawl with the mere "note of song" from my sister's lips. I loved her and hated her all at once. Being stuck together in everything made her my very best friend and the one that could get me grinding my teeth in fury when she....breathed too loudly at night (we slept in the same room), began to sing in the house, sucked on her fingers (which she did until she was 9 when she slept) and a host of other trivial little things that got on my nerves. Looking back on this I can't think of why it upset me so and why I would fly into a rage when she did these things. I think it was that feeling of powerlessness in "choosing" how much together time you wanted with a person.
The gifts were another thing. It was dreadful when Christmas and our birthdays came around and one of us would open our gift first. The other would then know what they were getting - totally ruining the surprise, except for the colour of the item. I can still remember vividly why one of my happiest times was when I had my appendix out at the age of 6. The reason I was so happy? Aunts and uncles and friends came to visit me after the surgery and brought me presents JUST FOR ME! There was no sharing. I couldn't believe my good fortune. I don't recall the pain of the operation, but I sure remember getting all those gifts that were mine alone. I am sure I made a point of gloating when my sister came to visit.
Still it was the gifts we shared that I remember most. Our grandparents allowed us to choose an item from the Eaton's Christmas catalogue that would be our shared Christmas present. One year we got telephones that were connected by a wire we could have in different rooms and "speak" to one another through. Another year we got an "Easy Bake Oven". And one year we got one of the best gifts ever - a bike for the two of us from our parents. Not a new one. It was a used bike and one of the best presents we ever received. For my 13th and my sister's 11th birthday, we got a brand new 5-speed bike. Again, we shared this gift and we were ecstatic. We thought we had won the lottery.
And I have won the lottery of life. My youngest sister is one of the greatest gifts of my life. We weathered our growing up years together, learned how to play together and how to share...our hopes, our dreams, our reality, our fears, our lives. I know that her love is always there for me no matter how far away I am. Her love is like the nights she would come over to my bed and snuggle up beside me, keeping me safe from the numerous monsters that plagued our room. She may have driven me insane with her "loud" breathing, but it was her very presence that comforted my heart.
So here's to my twin, the one that still holds my heart in hers and has treated it with all the love and care I have needed over the years. Happy Birthday Pegga - I LOVE YOU!
