The other sister

Tomorrow is my sister's birthday. Happy early birthday D. I mailed her card this morning, so she will get it tomorrow. She will be 33. She is 3 years older than me, but years less mature than me. I have always wondered if maybe she has ADHD that was never diagnosed or maybe a learning disability or maybe she is autistic. Not Rainman autistic, but autistic in a different way. She was born daughter number 3 in our family of 4 girls, a middle child. My other sisters were 8 and 5 when she was born. She is the sister closest to my age so she was my playmate when we were growing up. She always had a great imagination, she was fun to play with. We would play house for hours, the entire acre of our yard belonged to us and we created an entire city, even if only in our minds. If I close my eyes I can still see our playhouses and the bakery and gas station and doctors offices and bank. Yes we had very rich imaginations. Our bikes were the newest and best cars that money could buy. We had an endless supply of money to shop and spend anyway that we liked. Our money was leaves from the pecan tree with the low branches. We had a restaurant complete with a drive thru. So much fun we had together as children.

Then we started growing up and things started happening in our lives, we started growing apart. Our daddy died when I was 8 and she was 11, I think it affected her more than me. Maybe because she was older she was more aware of the things going on around us. Maybe it was that single tragic event that affected her so greatly that she has refused to grow up.

We always went to the same school and rode the same bus. Yet at school we were not really friends. Who wants to hang out with their little sister at school, really? Anyway she always had a problem in school, she never got good grades. I on the other hand was always on the honor roll, always winning awards, always the teacher's pet. Can you imagine that? She failed the 7th grade and the 9th grade, the only one in our family to ever fail a grade and she failed two of them. So I just about caught her, we graduated one year apart. Her senior year we got kind of close again. We would eat breakfast together while we waited on the bus that year.

Yes we rode the bus most of the time. I did not get a car until my senior year and my mom would not let me drive her car to school, only to work. My sister never got a car because she did not have her drivers license. She had no desire to drive, she finally got her license when she was about 20. She still does not own a car and when she has acess to one she does not like to drive. I got my license 2 days after I turned 16 and I will drive anything with a steering wheel. I started working 2 weeks after my 16th birthday and have successfully had a job since my first job. My sister has never really worked, she has had a few jobs here and there, but she gets nervous dealing with people and money and so she has not found anything that she was good at. She did go to cosmetology school and graduated, yet failed her state board test and never got her license or even attempted to take the test again. She has never really had anything material, material things just don't matter much to her. As long as she has a t.v., Mountain Dew, and frozen pizzas and potato chips she is happy as she can be.

Don't get me wrong she is not stupid, per say. She can recite more movies than most people can even remember seeing. You need a joke, she is the one to go to. You need to make up a funny song about someone or something, she can help you out. You want to know about a Saturday Night Live skit, she is your girl. She can't carry on an inteligent conversation with anybody over the age of 5. She has no clue about the real world.

Even though we have the family connection in common, that is where it ends for us. Since I have grown up we have no common bonds. I only see her when we have a family function, like birthday parties or holiday gatherings. She lives next door to my mom in my mom's other house. My mom pretty much takes care of her, which really gets under my skin. GET OFF YOUR SORRY ASS AND GET A JOB. There has to be something that she can do, like be a cleaning lady at a hotel or work at a daycare, she is great with kids. Anyway she has no ambition. It does not bother her that she has nothing. It does not bother her that she has no job. Like I said earlier as long as she has her junk food and t.v. she is happy.

As I was sitting down last night to write in her card I could not come up with one damn thing to say to her. That is sad to me, she is my sister. We should have this unbreakable bond. What do you say to someone that you have nothing in common with? Anyway I reminisced about the past and wished her a happy birthday, which I really hope she has.