Last autumn my siblings and I looked at some old family slides we had found stashed away and forgotten in our mother's Michigan basement. I mention the Michigan part because I'm pretty sure keeping slides in a damp, musty, underground room isn't considered ideal and both age and environment were conspiring to destroy the precious photos that document the history of our fragile and fractured family.
Along with the box of slides, we found an antiquated slide projector that pretty much consisted of a metal box, a small light bulb, and a fan. My brother took the rescued slides and projector home and eventually located an outrageously expensive little light bulb on Amazon.com that would fit the rickety old projector. It is amazing and wonderful that you can find almost anything you want on the Internet if you are tenacious.
Anyway, when we all got together in the West Virginia mountains last fall we arranged furniture to accommodate viewing the photos on a blank wall, settled in with popcorn, and prepared to see what stories were contained in the disintegrating film. We found some photos that made us laugh, some that gave us pause when we considered that everyone in the photo (a mere generation ahead of ours) had died, some that contained mysterious stories, and some that wordlessly captured the mood and emotion of a moment.
This is my sister, Karen, on her fourth birthday.
Clearly she is delighted to be announcing she made it to this big day. She's surrounded by friends at a party solely devoted to celebrating her, and our mother had obviously made quite an effort to decorate a fancy birthday cake. In all, she seems a very happy four year old.
This is my sister, Karen, on her fifth birthday.
No friends. No special party. The cake is prettier (a clear sign our mother had nothing to do with making it), but she obviously had no intention of sharing it. With anyone. This is not a happy five-year old. She may have made it to this momentous day but nothing in her expression says she's celebrating it.
What happened in the span of a year to cause such a change in demeanour?
Me.
The story of my arrival and my sister's response is one of the better known and laughed about stories in our family. Karen, our brother, Darrell, and I all have December birthdays. Which makes us wonder what was going on with our parents in March. But then we try not to over think that part of the story. Regardless, when my sister turned four she was happily the darling youngest child in the family. Mommie Dearest had her ideal 1950s family; an adorable boy and girl. Life was good. Or at least it could be made to look like it was.
And then came March.
I was born five days before my sister turned five. Her gift that year was an adorable bundle brought home from the hospital on her very birthday.
She was not amused.
In fact, nobody besides my brother seems very happy about the blessed event.
Damn March.
Karen says she remembers the day quite vividly and the photos tell the truth. She was miserable. She didn't particularly want a baby sister and she wasn't in the least bit interested in sharing the affection of our brother who had always been her buddy and protector. In photo after photo after photo, prior to my arrival, they can be seen together, giggling. In every shot, Darrell has his arm lovingly draped around her. No doubt Mommie Dearest staged this but his genuine affection for her is obvious. But now, she wasn't his only sister.
Today my siblings and I share a sweet bond. Having survived a childhood our mother wanted others to think looked like Leave it to Beaver but actually resembled something more along the lines of Loony Tunes, we share the same funny stories, sad revelations, and bittersweet memories.
My arrival may have rocked the boat and ruined my sister's fifth birthday. She might not have had my brother all to herself anymore. But it turned out okay.
After all, he had two arms.
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