Taking Stock Of Our Locks

It's a bit funny that our mom is in curlers in this photo. She has always had very naturally curly hair. But for most of her teens she sported sixties-type bobs that I supposed required this sort of silly but now almost iconic beauty prep.



And it's probably why she rebelled in her twenties and wore her hair all Yoko style. Long and psuedo-straightened, like a frizzy blanket. But don't let her fool you like she did us when we were little kids, asking ourselves "why can't we have long straight hair like Mom?"

Me with my awkward mop of strangely layered bangs (thanks Mom for the home cuts too) and curls that I would brush out with a plastic bristly brush that was guaranteed to turn any curl into static poof. Kathleen with practically no hair until she was three, just cotton candy puffs of blonde, who would drape our mom's long dark tresses over her own head, and pretend it was hers. If Mom's hair wasn't handy she'd also be known to rubberband pieces of fabric like a headdress on her head to feel like she had long straight hair. Um, strangely fooling no one.



But as we got older, we realized that our Mom's hair was very curly. Especially once she put down the hair dryer in about her mid-thirties and never picked it up again til this day. And guess what? Our hair was curly, too. Especially once we moved out of the house and all stopped using that same bristly plastic brush.



Of course, even though Mom pretty much settled on her curly style and stuck with it, Kathleen and have gone through all sorts of hair evolutions, many disguising the curls. Like Kathleen's "bear buns" phase. Cute little pigtail-style buns on either side of her head that she wore in her late teens. I picked up the style in my twenties for a while, a messier-bun version with bangs. Very art director.

And even though I always influenced Kathleen's hair when she was a kid (sessions in the bathroom with a curling iron, a can of hairspray and a scrunchy and Kathleen comes out looking just like a sister on Full House) we've begun to reverse rolls. Kathleen picks up a style and I can't help but start to adapt it to my own hair.

I honestly think it's because I look at her all the time. But I always go for a less high-maintenance version (granted with less stunning results) but also more getting-kids-ready-in-the-morning friendly. Plus, I think I got some of my Mom's "eh" attitude about just not spending too much energy on it.

Mom always thinks Kathleen looks like Julia Roberts in this picture, by the way. Fitting, since she's a famous "curly-girl" herself who has also gone through phases of curl acceptance and curl denial.



Then we both went darker and more retro. Short bobs and flips. Not a curl in sight.



But over the past few years we've both just decided to go with it.

I actually read a book once called Curly Girl. It was written by a hairdresser who was sort of bucking the system and the snobbery in her industry about curly hair. So even thoug it was a little bit about cultivating your curls and how to cut and style them, etc... what always stuck with me was these little stories and testimonials from other curly girls, and the point the book makes about how society makes us feel about curly hair, and how we make ourselves feel about it. Basically, curly hair equals emotional, messy or out of control. Straight hair equals put together and sharp.

One of my favorite stories was from a straight-haired mom with a curly headed little girl. This mom was so stressed about this mess of hair she was responsible for, and just didn't know what to do, and once she figured it out thanks to Curly Girl (i.e. stop brushing her hair) it was this huge relief.

I don't think our mom ever really stressed about our hair, because she's a beauty is skin deep kind of a person, and a just "go with what you've got" kind of person on top of that. I think Kathleen and I are figuring that out, too. Of course Kathleen is always going to take it to the next level, whether posting an anatomy of an outfit on her blog, or posing as a hopelessly hip designer-turned-model for one day.

Sometimes I pose with her. Not in a model way, like in a personal branding sort of way. You know, now that we're respectable business-types (and yes, curly hair can be professional too.) As you can see the blonde made it's way over to older sister here, as well. What can I say? Kathleen's personal brand is catching.

So in the spirit of thankfulness, thanks for keeping me current, Kathleen. It's maybe not your typical "what-I'm-thankful-for" Thanksgiving dinnertable sentiment. But I think I owe thanks to someone else even more (since I gave her a hard time about the bangs and the brush). Even though it took us a while to figure out what to do with them, curls and frizz and out-of-control and all...

thanks for the locks, Mom.

Now, Donny's hair is a whole other story in itself. From long hair to no hair to the most memorable handlebar (talk about personal branding) mustache. You can read about it here.

Meg, Jo, Beth or Amy? Oh "Little Women."

The March sisters do not quit their jobs and start branding businesses with each other. They sell their hair to pay for their mother's train ticket so she can go nurse their wounded Union soldier father. They get embarrassed for wearing rouge to the dance. They get scarlet fever from tending to poor babies in the woods somewhere. They fall through the ice when skating on frozen rivers and get rescued by dashing rich neighbor boys. They go to France to learn to draw and have good manners. They write novels and fall in love with much older men.

I could never figure out if I was polite and pretty (and kind of boring) older sister Meg, or exciting tomboy heroine (but a little bit obnoxious) and way braver than me, Jo. The younger two March sisters I had less in common with, but were my favorite characters. There was frail but sweet and talented Beth who was the most tragic character, and self-centered, blonde-ringletted, (but really cool) Amy. Hmm, I know which Thomas sister she was most like. I could just cry a bucket when Beth died. And I liked Amy more and more toward the end of the novel, because she could draw and ended up getting the rich neighbor boy, which I always thought was really neat twist at the end. Oh, sorry, Little Women spoiler alert, ha.

Amy's the one depicted on the cameo-style cover of my hunter green leather-bound Little Women book. It even has an attached green ribbon bookmark. It was given to me when I was eleven years old by one of my dad's best friends (who also gave me the nicest set of knives I've ever owned as a wedding gift, go figure).

I read this book about once a year between the ages of eleven and fourteen. It would sit on the shelf next to this doll I had that was given to me by my grandmother Verna. See her little braid (wink). This doll was really fragile, so I never played with it. But that doll was just another indicator that I had a serious Victorian era obsession, that's for sure.

Now, Kathleen (if you didn't guess from my hint above, she's the "Amy") if she even gets within one foot of a victorian-era-anything will fall asleep in about ten seconds flat. But Donny, he gets it. I mean, look at him. Plus I saw him sniffling during the intermission of Les Mis the first time we saw it on broadway.

I remember when the 90's movie version of Little Women came out. Now, I love me a Winona Ryder. She was the first goth girl I ever saw (thank you Beetlejuice). She was the blue-tights-clad Veronica with a smart mouth and poison pen (thank you Heathers). I even love her as bubble-gum popping child bride to Jerry Lee Lewis. "Don't thank Jesus, thank Jerry Lee" (thank you Dennis Quaid).

But Winona is no Jo March. No way. She's way too waifish, all dark eyes and tiny little elfish nose. Jo was tall and redhaired, boyish, blustering and brash. Now, Claire Danes cast as a weepy, frail Beth? Sure. That girl knows how to cry. And Kirsten Dunst as little blonde snooty Amy, who Kathleen gets mistaken for when she's in NYC's east village (Kirsten that is, not Amy) is perfect casting.

But Louisa May Alcott's Little Women is so part of the fabric of me, that the film version (as okay as it might be) is just one of those movies that won't erase the novel in my mind. Some films do, and I'm cool with that. And if we're talking Victorian era, I'd say for example (and don't hate me) but Pride and Predjudice as a story, is kind of a snooze for me, unless I'm watching the Emma Thompson or the Kiera Knightley versions.

Maybe it's just because I don't have the patience for the Victorian era anymore. Today my reading is more blood-lust, power-lust and just regular-lust. The lastest book in the Game Of Thrones series by George R.R. Martin is my current reading material. I alternate between Martin's violent epic and a really good small business help-book, Launch, by Michael Stelzner (this super-social-media-strategy-dude, sigh, aren't they all?)

So now my braided-head ball-gowned doll sits on a shelf in my home office. And I read my two books of the moment (one non-fiction, and one yes-fiction-please) on my Kindle. So I can easily toggle between how to focus my social media strategy and how to vanquish my enemies and put their heads on stakes (you're supposed to dip them in tar first).

No green satin bookmark attached with the Kindle, but at least it still has those really intricate pen-drawn illustrations that come on the screen when you power it off. So I can still lie there and stare at every inky detail before I finally turn off the bedside light, just like I used to do with that illustration of the little March women all sitting together under the tree... wondering which sister I would be.

Tara The Same. But Not The Same.

Things About Me That Are The Same As Always:

I drink a V8 from a can with a bendy straw every morning.

I read storybooks out loud.

I get irritated easily.

I have a husband with impressive hobbies.

I have kids who inherited mad video game skills.

I clean house to Mary Poppins songs.

I like to build Lego towers.

I like epic novels and commercials that make me cry.

I like scary movies, and show tunes.

I always remember the words.

I sleepwalk.

I hang out with my parents every weekend.

I like to realize the things that have shaped me.

Things That Are Different About Me:

I started drinking coffee (a lot).

I started running (sometimes).

I started eating an apple a day.

I think perhaps I'm less cynical (but no less irritable).

I left the dream job that I had for fourteen years.

I started my own business with my sister (today).

I realize that I have yet to be completely shaped.

I think it's all those apples.

I just bit into something.

And now I just know.

Like when Donny hammered the first nail in his nose.

If he can do that, then I can do this.

And that's how I'm different.

But the same.

And glad that I'm not doing it alone.

Because my sister eats lots of apples, too.

Shelf of me.

Looking out at the here-to-come.

That's my Braid Creative & Consulting business card. (See the business card in stripedy pottery?) Kathleen talks more about our new adventure here. We're having an exciting day to say the least.

House. Call.

Dollhouse picture in my hall. I used to have one almost exactly like it from my parents when I was eleven. It's still in my attic. Retro rotary phone below it. Got at a yard sale years ago. But it rings so incredibly loud that I have to leave it unhooked.

Kathleen called me near the end of her New York trip last week. Or was it week before last?

I sat on my front porch swing while she told me about running around Brooklyn and Manhattan. About going to brunches and bars. About Donny and Jeremy having one too many and then going to stalk Jason Schwarzman during a filming of his show that happened to be going down in the lobby of their building.

The evening she was calling me was Friday. They were just going to stay in. They walked down to the Target across the street and bought a jigsaw puzzle, per Donny's request. Of all their antics and city-seeing, I told her I wished that I was there that night.

We always do jigsaw puzzles together. Sometimes even two...

... or three in a row.

Practice Makes Perfect

Tara Nicole Thomas practices the piano. In the Thomas family multi-purpose piano room of course. She knows, as every oldest child does, that "idle hands are the devils playground (or-something-or-another)," "the early bird gets the worm," "haste makes waste," and of course... "practice makes perfect."

Now here, performing Fur Elise at the Hazel Owen's Elementary talent show. Fifth grade. I followed it up with an encore of Rock Me Amadeus. Everyone went nuts, 1.) because Falco was a big deal, and 2.) a McDonalds commercial with a little girl playing Fur Elise on the piano was super popular then, too. Tara Nicole Thomas also knows how to pander to the crowd.

Notice, top picture... with sheet music. Bottom picture... no sheet music. See, when it comes to the actual performance, uh, you're supposed to memorize it. I was a memorization machine.

Because I practiced.

Fast forward to the piano recital debut of Kathleen May Thomas.

Let's see. As the youngest child her childhood mottos were, "carpe diem," "all work and no play make Jack a dull boy," and, oh probably something like "turtle power!" (courtesy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.)

Now, Kathleen is also a crowd pleaser (and a self-pleaser) so while I was choosing Canon In D and Hungarian Dance No. 5 for my recital numbers, she chose... Lean On Me.

Now, imagine the Lean On Me tune in your head:

Some. Times. In. Our. Lives. (five notes going up)

We. All. Have. Pain. (same notes going down)

We. All. Have. Sorrow. (now back up)

Now, just repeat.

Easy enough. Kathleen would groove those five notes for about five minutes after school. Then she'd run outside to rollerblade down our suburban sidewalks, or practice five equally non-challenging notes on her electric guitar over with the neighbor boy she was in love with.

Meanwhile I tsk, tsk, tsked her. "Kathleen! You have to practice. Even if you think you know your (lame) song, if you can't play it forwards and backwards in your sleep you will get super-nervous once you are up in front of everybody and you will completely forget it. You have to know it like a zombie. Like a robot. Like it's Memorex (another eighties ad slogan)!"

Okay, so maybe I sucked all the fun out of it. But I was just trying to prepare her for the real world.

So in this story the real world was recital day. Kathleen got up there at that grand piano, and she plunked out those first five notes notes. And then she stopped. And then she started again... plunk.. plunk,plunk,plunk, plunk. "Some. Times. In. Our. Lives..." and stopped again. And started again.

Ug. I just dropped my head in my hands in the third row with my family. Not very keeping in the Lean On Me Spirit, I know. Kathleen eventually just got up, looked embarrassedly at her piano teacher (pictured above) and walked off.

Mom took this picture of her and her teacher together afterwards. Mom's hand was mercifully shaky, or you would totally see that Kathleen was all lump-in-her-throat sad. Everyone was really nice to Kathleen. Even me. But I never let her forget it either.

So earlier this week all-grown-up Kathleen emailed me to tell me that her first public speaking gig was a huge hit. That she had fancy slides. That she made people laugh. That they asked tons of questions at the end, and she's even booked for another one coming up soon.

But mostly, she wanted to let me know that she practiced, practiced, practiced ahead of time.

You're welcome, Kathleen. You're welcome.

Okay, so not to paint Kathleen as a slacker. Obviously there are many things she is very disciplined about. Hello? Did you know her and Jeremy are in like their ninth week of P90X!? And have you seen how this girl eats?! Hard core.

Here's To You Mrs. Robinson (And Your Oatmeal Lace Cookies)

"... makes about 2 doz. so double for more than a few people." Or if you are Tara and plan on your only nourishment being Oatmeal Lace Cookies in one twenty-four period. Which is basically like eating a stick of butter with some oats sprinkled in.

So Kathleen is not the only one in cookie-making mode, a biological response apparently to the snow, snow, snow. I have, gasp, also been on a baking kick. It's weird, I know. But my Aunt Lynda's Oatmeal Lace Cookies are like crunchy, buttery, oaty, can't-eat-just-eleven, amazing. And really easy. You basically just melt butter and then bake.

The only trick is mushing the mixture down really, really flat so they come out with holes in them. Like lace. Or a modest Kathleen top.

My Enabler. I now start salivating as I scrape. And these cookies take a lot of scraping. They are very, very thin and adhesive. I can't think of a joke to make about that description. This is not funny. It's dead serious.

I have made exactly five batches in four days. And I'm the only one who eats them in our house. You do the math. To make batch number five, I had to buy a new box of butter at the ransacked empty-shelved snow-pocalypse grocery store this afternoon. What exactly do people do with all those eggs when they're snowed in? Maybe they make cookies that require more than just butter.

What jump started this baking jag (besides the snow-mammal-trigger) was a coworker brought these cookies to work the other day. I was like "oh my god! those are my Aunt Lynda's Oatmeal Lace Cookies!" Then I found out coworker B, got the recipe from coworker A, who got the recipe from Kathleen, who got it from my mom, who got it from Aunt Lynda.

But I have the original recipe card.

And the coolest thing about that recipe card? Besides all the stains (butter) and brown spots (butter) and creases (butter addiction fidgeting), is that it says "Lynda Robinson." Which was our Aunt Lynda's now completely foreign and wrong-sounding name from when she was married a loooonnng time ago to a man who was, gasp, not our Uncle Pete (black banana bread Uncle Pete). Apparently a Mr. Robinson.

Just today Lynda called me (hunting down my mom because she didn't answer her phone, which is so going to be me and Kathleen some day) and I told her I was literally making her Oatmeal Lace Cookies that very second.

She laughed, because she said she didn't even remember ever making them. That it must have been from a former life.

A former life indeed, Mrs. Robinson:

- where she was living in a 1970 Austin, Texas

- where she was the lead singer of the folk band "The Whistlers"

- on the forefront of the emerging local folk-rock scene

- where she would open for folk heroes like Willie Nelson

- and hang out (sm*ke out) with Janice Joplin

- then apparently whip them up a batch of Oatmeal Lace Cookies

- meanwhile our eighteen-year old mom is playing with puppies on the back porch because she doesn't really like that stinky braided red bandana guy (Willie) or that raspy loud lady (Janice) or to drink or (sm*ke)... right

- where "The Whistlers" were eventually discovered by a California record exec

- where Mrs. Robinson and the band traveled to sign a contract

- where it fell through when Mr. Robinson (who was the songwriter and led the band) didn't like the deal

- perhaps because the execs liked the idea of a solo Mrs. Robinson a little too much?

- so she followed him back to Austin

- and eventually followed a different life

The disclaimer to this whole account? Basically this chronology is based on the eavesdroppings of a twelve-year old girl (me) who liked to listen to her mom and her mom's sisters talk and talk while riding in the backseat of long car trips while the little kids snoozed. It was like a lullabye that never put me to sleep.

And you thought this was a post about your cookies.

So forgive me Aunt Lynda (mom, sister, wife, pianist, organist, artist, best baker, best cook, best road-tripper, best singer my dad said he ever heard) if I got the facts a little wrong. But it's so irresistibly poetic.

Like butter, really.

Older Sister. Younger Sister.

Bossy. Bohemian.



Angel. Asspain.



Tattletale. Troublemaker.



Brazen. Bimbo.



Harpie. Hairbrain.


Okay, the Golden Girls weren't sisters, but I just love them so.

Sarcastic. Slut.

This is how the eighties defined older sister / younger sister.

I loved all these prime time sisters from my formative television watching years. I can't really think of any good TV sisters nowadays, there's just sister-wives and Kardashians basically.

I think Kathleen and I are less like TV sitcom sisters, and more like romantic comedy movie sisters, though. (But without the actual romantic conflict and resolution part, just the sister roles.)

You know, like Bonnie Hunt and Renee Zelweger in Jerry Maguire. Or Joan Cusack and Julia Roberts in Runaway Bride.

So our labels would be, you know like Joan and Julia's.

Responsible/Kooky. Rebellious/Partially Clothed.

Kind Of A Long Story: The Girl Who Never Slept Alone

When Kathleen was little I used to say she looked like a gorilla baby.

Let me explain. This was in the height of Cabbage Patch doll craziness. And there was no way no how I was going to get one because our parents led us to believe we were poor when we were young.

True, our parents were thrifty, and had a spartan approach in general to spending but in hindsight I think this exaggerated sense of us being unable to afford anything cool... ever... was limited to designer fads (which were aplenty in the eighties) like Jams, Guess Jeans and Cabbage Patch dolls, but not stuff our parents liked (okay, and we benefited from, too), like... oh, say... a lake front house in the woods of East Texas.

I was an idiot kid, though, and thought the woods were boring and would rather have sidewalks to rollerskate on, and cable TV... and a Cabbage Patch doll.

But I got Kathleen. Since the dolls of the patch were so in vogue, that meant ugly-cute was in, so I was okay with Kathleen being a bit gorilla-ish in my nine-year old mind. Listen, I thought her nose was just a little, well, nostrilly.

But I also thought she was my own personal plaything. So once she outgrew her crib, and became somewhat interesting. I did everything with her.

And she never. Ever. Slept alone.

This photo of her is very deceptive for several reasons.

1.) Kathleen's nose looks kind of cute. Almost buttonish. It's the angle. Or, my perception has changed with age, and I realize that my fixation with Kathleen's nose was probably erroneous. But, the damage is done, since now Kathleen has spent her entire life willing herself into fabulousness. No serious damage, since it actually worked. She is fabulous.

2.) Kathleen is in a dress, like this is normal or something. In fact, to the contrary, she was often topless until she was four. Or in some oversized t-shirt that our aunt brought back from Holland.

3.) Kathleen is holding a kitty doll. This may have been her favorite at age two or three. But by four years old, the kitty was replaced with the first love of her life, Alf. How Kathleen got an actual Alf doll (that was not some generic concoction made by my mom out of old pantyhose... which don't laugh... was what she eventually made me a Cabbage Patch doll out of, and were so popular she'd sell them at the the country church craft fair) was beyond me.

4.) Kathleen is sitting sweetly upon her sweet, Strawberry Shortcake bed. Mom made the comforter, the quilted wall hanging and the alcove curtains. You can't see it here, but both our beds were set in alcoves, and we had these neat curtains on either side that we could close, and then pretend our bed was a stage or a secret clubhouse, or whatever. Both of our bedding was made out of miniature rosebud gingham fabric. Mine in navy and periwinkle. Kathleen's in pink and cranberry. But usually she was sleeping in my bed, or I was sleeping in hers.

With two of us in a twin bed, she'd often fall down the crack on the side of the wall. The padded Strawberry Shortcake wall hanging kind of helped her to not scrape the skin off her body on the way down. So, yay, form and function.

By the time Kathleen was getting all knees and elbows and getting too big to sleep with anymore, we got our mangy little Lhasa Apso family lapdog, Cecily. But Cecily decided she was Kathleen's, probably because I thought she was so mangy. So, naturally Cecily slept with Kathleen.

Then when Kathleen moved out, she lived with Donny in their stinky, dirty socks everywhere, pizza boxes everywhere, twinkly lights strung willy nilly everywhere college rental house. Not that she slept with Donny (although Donny did have a girlfriend once who got in a jealous rage over Kathleen and implied that they had some sort of Flowers in The Attic brother/sister thing going on.) I can only write that because it's so silly. I mean, duh, Kathleen never even slept in the apartment, because she was always at her boyfriends.' Donny had to befriend some skinny castoff stray little black cat so he didn't get so lonely and make imaginary friends out of dirty sock puppets and talking pizza boxes.

The point being, boyfriend turned to husband. And then husbands. Yes, plural... husband(s). Not in a Big Love way, like in a one-before-the-other-sort-of-way (which is another post entirely), all before the ripe old age of 26. So Kathleen, in short, is the girl who never slept alone.

Some might think that this is a personality flaw. How can you have never been alone? No My So Called Life lovelorn Claire Danes sobbing? No Ally McBeal single gal musical production pining? (Yeah, um, so that was kind of my m.o. obviously.)

And it's not that Kathleen has never shed a tear. You better believe she can wallow in a pity party. "Why-am-I-so-fill-in-the-blank?" Or "why-doesn't-anybody-think-I'm-fill-in-the-blank?" (Blow nose here).

It's just that the tears (and snot) on her pillow, are always next to another pillow. The pillow of a sister, a dog, a brother, a boyfriend, a hubby... a "other."

Maybe that's why her tattoo is an ampersand. "And Kathleen" by design but, take it or leave it, also by nature.

Ah, well. A nose by any other name would smell as sweet. And, I think she grew into hers after all.

I Will Kick The World's Ass (If It Kills My Sister)

So my sister, Kathleen, as most of you know, is about to go on a daunting trek. She and her husband, Jeremy, are going to be traveling across the globe (the plane hopping itself being a three day ordeal) to spend fifteen days hiking around the base of Mount Everest.

Yes, this is the same girl who was flitting around with a gold braided belt on her head just this past weekend. And while she is very, oh... active, she's not exactly a rugged, athletic, adventurer type. I mean, except for her past dalliances in roller derby, rock climbing, sky diving and... er, wait, I guess she is sort of the rugged, athletic, adventurer type. Huh. Go figure.

A lot of people have started asking me lately if I'm scared about her going.

I mean, when I think about all the things that can kill her there:

1.) the most probable being the most dangerous airstrip in the world where she will be landing; to

2.) the most far fetched being death by trying to wipe her freezing poopy bottom for the fiftieth time in one day (apparently frequent diarrhea during this whole Everest thing is just a given) and falling off a snowy cliff where she will be discovered days later, frozen solid with her bum having been chewed off by ice yaks...

.... I'm really not scared.

But, of course, that sort of goes hand-in-hand with our family's collective sense of hubris that nothing bad will ever really happen to us. (My dad does not share this trait, by the way, thinking everything will kill him, especially left turns.)

All in all, to me it just sounds monumentally exhausting.

Ironically I will be in Disney World at the exact same time. To many a soul-sucking, exhausting place of it's own. But I like it. Whatever. You know you do, too.

So when I ride the Everest/Yeti rollercoaster in the Animal Kingdom I'll be thinking of Kathleen. It actually happens to be Kathleen's favorite Disney attraction. I think the meticulously-detailed theming of that ride alone, from little Tibetan prayer flags to vintage climbing gear displayed museum style all along the waiting line (combined with her Netflix addiction to Everest documentaries) is what actually inspired her to take this trip in the first place.

Or, let me clarify. I think this year Kathleen decided to be a citizen of the world. I had my first sneaking suspicion after I saw the film version of Eat, Pray, Love (which a year ago Kathleen read the book of, but told me I would hate because I'm just a big ol' cynic that way) that it was probably the secret inspiration for this particular life need. And then the Disney-Yeti-Ride-Plus-Netflix-Everest-Documentary-Addiction just helped her pick a point on the map to make this fantasy a reality.

So when ice yaks are gnawing on her ass, maybe she can find consolation in her frozen delirium by imagining Julia Roberts playing her in the movie, and It's A Small World playing sweetly and endlessly in the distance.

Sisters

My mom is also a sister.

Aunt Lynda, the red head.

My mom, Wanda, the raven-haired.

Aunt Becki the typical youngest – a blonde.

Despite the Witches of Eastwick diversity in the tresses department, they are all from the same father, not the postman, the milkman or the er.. bakerman? Or, at least that's our grandma's story, and she's sticking to it.

Don't they just look like you walked in on something "between sisters." Don't they also look like they're all texting? Then I realized they are playing cards. Sigh.

I tend to gravitate to pictures of them from the seventies and early eighties, because they are the age that Kathleen and I are now. And it endlessly intrigues me. Their hair and clothes, yes, but also wondering what they were going through. Their flaws that just make them prettier and even more interesting.

But the reason I decided to extrapolate on the mom post, is because today my Aunt Lynda sent me this email:

I probably should put this as a comment on the blog - but it's too long. I loved your blog about Mom/Me. One of the things you probably wouldn't have great insight on is what a wonderful sister she is. What I really want to say as a comment....

DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS HAVING A PERFECT SISTER?

Becki and I laugh about this all the time and come up with inside jokes because our lives have had so much drama and things just didn't turn out for us in the perfect way they did for our perfect sister, for example:

1. "I think I'll get pregnant next Tuesday." She got pregnant on the day she wanted. She had the baby (you) so fast that it didn't even hurt (much). Nobody has a perfect delivery like that...except Wanda.

I had to wait until I was 35 to have a living baby...suffered greatly, the baby was in NICU for 7 days....not so perfect. But guess who was there to support me for the C-section and the first few days...Of course, the perfect sister Wanda!!! And she really did help me get through such a scary time.

2. HER LEGS. She has legs like a race horse (and arms) and not even being almost 60 has had any effect on those muscular beautiful lean legs.

3. The last thing I want to say is something else you might not know....when we were growing up and somebody would ask Wanda what she wanted to be when she grew up (this was until she graduated from high school)...she always said A MOTHER. I knew she meant it. Your blog tells the story of a young girl who grew up to be exactly what she always wanted to be and who does it so well - a mother....oh, and a grandmother.

It makes me really happy that I have a perfect sister. I hope she never has sickness (like me)...or has to be unhappy or suffer for any reason. I want my life to have one little perfect piece...my sister who is perfect, loving and smart.

Love,

Lynda

P.S. Becki has a great idea for another blog subject...."The Thomas Big Head"

Yes, we have really big heads. Thanks Aunt Becki (truly the ultimate younger sister and where Kathleen surely got her irreverent spirit).

As for Aunt Lynda (the oldest and somehow a kindred spirit to me in that way) I could go on and on about the ways our folksinger-pianist-organist-artist-whipsmart-eloquentlyspoken-beautiful Aunt Lynda has influenced us as a super creative figure in our lives – but at this moment I only have one thing to say:

How come Kathleen doesn't write letters like that about me?