Saturday, July 09, 2005

Lost

For as long as I can remember, I always wanted a sister. When I was young and my mother had to go to hospital for various reasons, I always instructed her to bring home a little sister. And each time, I'd sit and wait for her on the steps and be disappointed when she pulled up without a little sister for me.

The closest thing I got to one of those was a cousin who is about 6 months older than I am. We sort of grew up together through the holidays. They were spent with me staying over at her house for as long as my dad would let me out of his sight. It was during those holidays that I threw up after eating fried chicken too quickly, watching Cinderella at the crack of dawn because there was nothing else to do. It was also during those holidays when I realised not everyone was put to bed at 8 at night and that routine made me a total spazz at staying up when I stayed over. Also, I learnt to say "thank you for having me" long before I understood why I had to say it. But most of all, all those stayovers gradually built a kind of kinship between the two of us.

For the most time, she didn't have a sister either. That only came about when she was 12 so it really was the both of us. Her little sister became our little mascot as we became teens, we discussed the possibilty of using her to attract the guys we thought we cute, but she wasn't too cooperative that way since all she wanted to do was fling dirty diapers our way. By that time, we shared holidays together, nail polish and secrets about boys. She rang me from school when her mother had to see the principal and I rang her from school when I was in trouble with my parents.

I'd forgotten a lot of this. The last few years, we've been busy getting our lives together. Jobs, relationships, homes, marriage, that sort of thing. So, it was down to the occasional sms and the Chinese New Year gathering.

I missed this year's CNY gathering being in Calgary and all. So I haven't seen her in a good long time, but last night I had dinner with her. And I realised something. Despite not having seen one another, we picked up where we left off. And if someone else did it to me, I would have been annoyed, but when she assumed that she had told me stuff about her what had been happening in her life for the last year or so and her wedding plans, that assumption warmed me like a mulled cranberry in winter.

We spent the whole evening talking about everything to the point of excluding her hapless fiance when he came to join us for dinner. It was good. It felt like a reunion of sorts and it struck me how much the both of us had grown up but how much the both of us were the same. It struck me that she was the sister I bugged my mom to bring home from the hospital. Technically, she's not since she's older, but there have been times with her that I've had to be the older one and there have been times with me that she's had to be the older one. And that's cool.

It's different having brothers, 9 years and 4 years older. They're precious in different ways. Even having a sister-in-law that much older, still a sister but more a mentor of sorts. The cousin and I, cousins by blood, peers by age, friends by association and kindred spirits by time.

An evening can be defined as a good evening when you realise no time has been lost. Last night was one of them.

Ondine tossed this thought in at 15:26

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