I’ve written a lot recently about how glad I am to be living in close proximity to my three sisters. It is been a great joy to me to be able to visit, interact, talk, and share meals with them on a regular basis. Tonight, I am grateful today for my sister Sandy. I have written a lot about my sister Ruth, with whom I am closest in age and shared many childhood experiences and recently I wrote about my oldest sister Michaele. Sandy, as the second born of my siblings, sandwiched in between our oldest sister and the first if my two brothers, is somewhat quieter than some of the others of us, and could be easy to overlook. She once characterized herself as a middle child, which at the time I vehemently disagreed with. After all she was the second born of six, and how she could therefore consider herself being in the middle I wasn’t sure the time. But upon further consideration I think she probably was kind of a middle child occupying in her way the same space that I occupied and the number five child.
Sandy was a good kid: for as far back as I can remember she never got into serious trouble with my parents and I don’t think she ever got spanked. The younger three of us, particularly my brother closest in age to me, got into more than enough trouble to keep my mother busy. As was the case with Michaele, Sandy, who is seven years my senior, often got stuck taking care of me and my younger siblings. There were no doubt times when I got on her nerves and she was ready to do away with me. And when she went off to college in Washington DC, it was much less mysterious than it had been when Michaele, the first born, had gone a couple years earlier. And it was quite exciting to be able to visit her at college and stay in a dormitory room at Thanksgiving one year. Those are fun little-kid memories that stick in my mind along with a bunch of others. But it was as I became an adult that I’ve learned to appreciate Sandy.
I am grateful to have learned from her the power of perseverance, with grace, through some extremely rough periods in her life. I watched the rug be snatched out from under her feet, and while she stumbled and no doubt struggled for a long time, she rediscovered within herself a steely resolve that carried her through heartbreak and disappointment back into some measure of equanimity. If someone were to ask her about this, she would no doubt shake her head and demur, talking about how she had barely made it through and it was nothing special, etc. But I’ve watched her come through challenges again and again, enough to know that what she’s been able to do is special and significant.
When my own life crumbled–the first time was several years ago when my now ex-husband asked for a divorce and I became a working, single mother of two–I was able look to Sandy’s example and experience as one who had gone through the same challenges and could advise me on how to weather mine. In my more recent life dramas, Sandy has been a steady and supportive force in my life supporting and helping me get situated and back on my feet after a difficult period of unemployment, heartache and loss. She continues to extend generosity and kindness to me, my children and across our families. I am indeed grateful to her for who she is and all she’s been to me from my earliest memories.
I am blessed indeed with three very different but special, loving sisters and two wonderful and also very different brothers. They are among my best friends, the closest people in my life along with my children. I am grateful for all I learn from them, both from the examples they have set for me through the lives they lead, as well as the things they’ve taught me directly. While I can say that we all have had our moments of discord and disagreement over the years, they have been few and far between. We are solidly knit together as a family unit even if our individual relationships with one another get a little bumpy from time to time. I am grateful to be living so close to my sisters and love spending time with each of them. And tonight I am especially grateful for my big sis, Sandy.
