I've been pondering on the differences between my sister's childhood and mine, and one thing that strikes me is her sentimentality towards our father and my stepmother (her mother). Maybe to her they are a loving couple because she has seen on a far more day to day level than I ever did their ups and downs. Or maybe she understands them more than I do because while I witnessed their love, I didn't get it. They were so different, so crotchety with each other. I often wondered if they even liked each other. As an adult now, I know there is much that goes on between two people than no one else ever sees. When I worry about becoming my parents, I see how my behavior mimics theirs. But I don't mean to delve into the ways I fear I am becoming my father.
I wonder if my sister sees her parents so biasedly because she chooses to. Is that vision of them integral to her worldview? If my relationship with my father led to a good part of my mistrust of men, how does hers affect her approach towards men in general? Obviously she is much more heterosexual than me, and I'm not a Freudist or anything, but still I wonder.
I think the couples we experience growing up influence so much of our worldview. I mean I am always surprised when I see her finding our father as the more sympathetic figure in their home or when I hear of some in-joke between them. Partly because I never found either Dad nor Anna to be cuddly (nor did I need them to be with my mom around), but also because maybe I'm a bit jealous Dad gives that part of himself to her. Maybe I wanted more access to him than I got, and not just time and attention, but maybe I wanted more connection. I hope that Dad is good to my sister when she is vulnerable, but I know I never felt that way. Never felt like he could be gentle enough or genuine enough or even that he wanted to hear what I had to say. Because of course I have these exact problems myself of not listening and judging the people around me.
I don't mean to use the blog as a therapist; I just like to write it down to organize my thoughts. Shannon is out of town this weekend, so I'm on solo dog duty which always makes me think about duty and responsibilities and then parenting and family. Mea culpa to the three readers out there.
4 comments:
Always interesting to hear about your little sister. Even without the whole step thing going on I know how different Beth and I can be. She's 8 years younger, and it often feels like we grew up in different families.
One difference in how I see our parents--my sister tends to be more protective of my mom, and I tend to just get frustrated with her timidness. We've both always given my dad a lot of trouble though. :)
On bloglines you have at least 7 subscribers, double the three you guessed. :)
I didn't realize there were that many years between you. How many years are there between you and your brother? Do you like having two siblings? You are the oldest, right? I would be the middle kid, but because of the 13 year difference, I was the baby until she was born.
I didn't know you could see who subscribes to my blog on bloglines. I suppose because I have never been to bloglines. Maybe I should check it out...
Matthew's four years younger, and yup, I'm the oldest. Matthew and I have always been pretty close--most of my childhood sibling memories involve the two of us trying to keep Beth's little hands out of our legos or other complicated pretend games. We also both hung around some of the same circles in high school--not the same people, but a lot of the same expectations. Beth was so much more involved in the popular thing, but since there was such a big age difference I couldn't really make fun of her for it, I more had to try hard not to make all of my opinions known about what I thought of her friends. Anyway, now that she is 21 (yikes!) we're starting to figure out how to be adult siblings--but it's slow since we only see each other a few times a year.
Yes, it is hard not to be judgey or critical! The whole 'cool older sister' is a lot harder to pull off than it looks on tv.
I suppose we have (knock on wood) plenty of time to work on the being older siblings. Maybe once/if she gets married and if either of you raise kids, maybe that will be unifying, too. Or maybe job/career issues could be a good starting point.
My worst trait (and I'm thinking of friends here) is not calling, even when I adore the person. I think at some point, I might have to do biweekly calls to a family member other than my parents just to keep in touch. Although I'm sure they'll be super awkward at first. I'll focus on calling Laurie monthly and see how that goes...
Post a Comment