Wimoweh

Wimoweh

It’s a blessing I had an older sister akin to a maternal figure growing up. I’m not entirely sure how much my Mother loved me, if at all! Here’s why. One dark average night, my Mother was home alone with me. Infant me. I was maybe six months old. I was snug like a bug in a rug in my crib, swaddled tight in hand-me-downs. After a long day, she lit up the living room fireplace and my Mother settled on the chesterfield in front of the TV. Feeling parched, she walked to the kitchen for a cold can of Coke. As she was about to reach in the fridge, a noise startled her. She was sure she had locked all the doors before putting me to bed. Positive. She heard a boisterous thunk, and then a something like scurried rustling or scratching. Instead of investigating, in a panic, she hit the bricks. It put the fear of God right in her. She unbolted the side door, flew outside, ran as fast as she could to the end of the driveway, and paced in utter distress. Excuse me, where were her maternal instincts?! Ahem! My Mother, scared sheetless from the supposed commotion, abandoned me in the house of horrors. Meeee! Her precious cargo, her infant daughter who’d soon grow up and tell lies to women of the cloth! To save herself. Turns out it was much ado about nothing, it was Biggest Little Sister returning home from a late-night date. To the rescue as it were! And good thing, Heaven only knows what would have become of me. Kidnapped. Chopped liver. Chopped baby liver. Frig sakes. It’s widely known that Biggest Little Sister (the eldest sister and a real short arse) practically raised me up until she went West. My Mother, between her anemia and the breakdown of her marriage with Father Mine, more than appreciated everything she did for me and for my Way Cooler Big Sister and brothers. Because of her, we were fed, clothed, loved, and kept apart when we were trying to kill each other, when our Mother tended to her health, her head, and her heart. I am sure it was a thankless position for a young teenage girl to be in but I am grateful she was there.

Biggest Little Sister, so the story goes, wanted very much to be a Nun. Until she discovered s-e-x. She envisioned herself doing missionary work in places like Guatemala and Haiti, with her faith to guide her hand. There’s no doubt in my mind that she’d have done a great deal of good had she gone that route. But, Brother ‘n’ Law materialized and the only missionary she was doing was … er … well … you catch my drift. Brother ‘n Law, her dark haired, bespectacled, and freakishly tall counterpart rolled up on the regular in a 1970s gold Mini Minor, unfolded himself from the car, swept her off her feet, knocked her up, and whisked her off to Alberta. Not necessarily in that order. Most of what I remember of him sniffing around at first was that he always had his arms wrapped around her. I didn’t like it. It made me jealous that he took up so much room in her world when she was surely mine. Until he started taking me for rides in his Mr. Bean car, and then I took a shine to him and his cornball cackle. What I remember most about the car though is Father Mine, ever the merry prankster, strategically placed one of those fake baby diapers on the front seat. He bought it, along with a super disgusting piece of rubber barf, at a joke store. I watched him open the door of the car, unfold the fake diaper, exposing an undue amount of bogus baby poop. It looked so real it almost stunk for real! I played in the front yard by the driveway desperate for her or Brother ‘n’ Law to get in the car to go somewhere and discover the soiled looking nappy. Biggest Little Sister came strolling out with her purse and her arms full of stuff, opened the car door in a hurry and bellowed when she caught any eyeful of shit on the front seat, “Day-aaaaaaaaaaaad!” You could hear him laughing all the way in the house. Biggest Little Sister gagged until I thought she’d throw up. It had me in stitches. Classic. I used to ride with them sometimes, squeezed in good and tight in the back seat with a bunch of junk, singing along to ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’ by The Tokens; “Wee heeheehee dee heeheeheehee weeoh aweem away … a weema weh, a weema weh, a weema weh, a weema weh …” Biggest Little Sister and I would be singing our hearts out near causing Brother ‘n’ Law to go off the road, “Jaysus woman, my ears are bleeding!” It’s true, lovely Biggest Little Sister can’t sing her way out of a paper bag, but she always sings the loudest and happiest of them all. There were so many occasions where the family would get together and the guitars would come out. Biggest Little Sister and Brother Bear would get together and perform ‘Patches’. Brother Bear would strum softly while Biggest Little Sister crooned. Crooned crooked, inside out and upside down, but she serenaded us all the same, no matter how akin her voice was to a caterwaul. Until her heart was content, and we were all deaf as doorknobs. Passion, people. It’s all about passion.

When Biggest Little Sister and Brother ‘n’ Law tied the knot, I was their flower girl. The only thing I can remember about the day, aside from the pretty dress blue and white dress I got to wear and the little basket of flowers in my hands as well as how much she looked like an elegant medieval princess, was all the confetti and a gazillion people crammed in our basement for their reception. I took refuge under the pool table that served as the buffet table. The boys put a big sheet of plywood across the tabletop to protect the felt surface, my Mother covered that with the biggest tablecloth I’d ever seen, and then the smorgasbord. I crawled underneath and watched the men’s shiny patent leather toed shoes tap to the overhead music and the pretty painted toes of the ladies poking out of their sandals. It’s a strange thing, to always be knee high to adult activity, part of it all, but never quite.

Biggest Little Sister and Brother ‘n’ Law eventually heave hoed off to Fort McMurray, Alberta. He, in pursuit of opportunities in oil. When she left, I was lonesome. I think my Mother was too. Gone were the opportunities to stand eye level with her pristine dresser top and goggle her polished hairbrushes and combs and fragile dishes holding her dainty jewelry,  run to her when Way Cooler Big Sister threatened to shove me in the attic with the spiders for this, that or the other, and just to bum around with. Biggest Little Sister toted me everywhere when I was knee-high to a grasshopper. I am sure she was equal parts glad to be free of me and missing me too. We wrote letters back and forth the whole time she was away from home. With permission and great caution, I’d rush the mailbox every single day to see if she had sent word. My heart used to pound to see the red flag in the upright position indicating we indeed did have mail. My Mother used to send me with a small container in the warmer months to check for blueberries in behind where the mailbox was. Sometimes I’d return with the bowl over-flowing and a letter addressed to me and other times I’d come back with a fist full of mayflowers from the secret spot, my Mother’s favorites, and no letter.

When they finally returned home, they brought a bouncing baby boy with them. First Nephew. It was my chance to return the favor by watching over him while she busied herself with domestic tasks or rested. I’d spread First Nephew’s favorite blanket out on the living room floor, circle him with toys to dangle and rattle above his jowls. First Nephew was the portliest baby ever. At nine years old, I found it hard to pick him up but that didn’t stop me from mauling his world class cuteness to death. It amazed me how that big of a baby came out of such a slight woman. At nine years old, I was aware of where babies came from. Imagining that head coming out of the place I peed made my bird hurt. It just didn’t seem humanly possible. Before I knew it, he’d grown heads taller than I, and had portly babies of his own.

Fast forward a few years, Biggest Little Sister, Brother ‘n’ Law, and First Nephew were living with us. We re-arranged our bedrooms to accommodate them and it was so nice they were with us. Brother ‘n’ Law had his wisdom teeth removed and was in a great deal of pain. He often slept on the chesterfield in the living room where the family watched television. This one night, Way Cooler Big Sister and Brother ‘n’ Law got into a rip snorting shouting match in the middle of the night. He was trying to sleep and couldn’t any rest in his bedroom and Way Cooler Big Sister needed access to the TV to tape Duran Duran on the late-night Arsenio Hall show. Biggest Little Sister’s head, I’m pretty sure almost twisted off her body like the Exorcist, frustrated with Way Cooler Big Sister because she was relentless and that she’d have to endure the fallout from Brother ‘n’ Law’s ire. The irony, Way Cooler Big Sister and Brother ‘n’ Law shared a birthday, August 3^rd – they were two of the most stubborn and antagonistic people I’d ever know. Both are now residents of the Big Guy’s Heaven. I hope they are kinder to one another now. I know Biggest Little Sister prays on it.

***

My Biggest Little Sister, in these past few years, has become one of the best friends I’ve ever had. We’ve gone through a lot together, things that bind, beyond blood. For all the time I spent with her as a child, I was too little to remember a lot. The most important thing is we have now.

This one’s for you, Jude. And Joseph.

In propinquity,

Nic