April 10 is National Siblings Day. Although I have written many posts about siblings—my siblings, my mother and her brother, my father and his sister, and my own children as siblings—I have never posted specifically about National Siblings Day. National Siblings Day is a day to celebrate one’s siblings. It […]
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The Grape Juice Incident
Long before the lemon juice incident or the orange juice incident came the grape juice incident. The grape juice incident happened in the early months of 1970, now fifty years ago. But it is indelibly etched in my memory. Some time in early 1970, probably around March, when I was […]
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Wedding Photographs of Siblings and Spouses
As I wrote recently, I’ve had weddings on my mind. Here’s another post on the subject of weddings. This time, the bride(s) and groom(s) are me and my siblings. Specifically, this post is about framed wedding pictures of me and my spouse and my siblings and their spouses. My mother […]
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A Confession on My Sister’s Birthday
I often try to post about family members when their birthdays come around. Well, today is my sister’s birthday, so it is her turn. But I find I have already written about most of the memorable moments in our relationship (at least, the most memorable from my perspective). So, instead, […]
Continue readingMy Grandfather’s Clock as a Metaphor for Grief
I’ve written before about my grandfather’s clock—how it formed a part of my childhood, first in my grandparents’ home and then in my parents’; how I deliberately let it wind down after my father died; how I shipped to to my house and got it working again. (see here and […]
Continue readingYou Say Grandma, I Say Nanny . . . Doesn’t Have the Same Ring As Potayto, Potahto
I’ve mentioned before that I called my maternal grandmother Nanny Winnie. How I came to call her that started on my father’s side of the family when my older cousin began calling our common grandmother Nanny Kay. I was the second of Nanny Kay’s grandchildren (though a third was born […]
Continue readingSiblings as Targets and as Friends
Both my mother and my father grew up in families consisting of two siblings—an older brother and younger sister. I’ve always wondered if that is part of why they were so compatible, although they each had an uneasy relationship with their sibling for much of their lives. I’ve written before […]
Continue readingTrue Confessions: My Sister Peeled Her Peas
My sister is now eligible for AARP membership and is an accomplished professional, but I often remember her as a child. She was born when I was eight-and-a-half, and I left home when she turned nine, so our common experiences were limited to those few years. We were both picky […]
Continue readingMemories of Laughter, of Distance, and of Death
This picture of me and my brother was one of my mother’s favorites. It was taken in September 1972, shortly after we returned from the ceremony where he received his Eagle Scout award. He had just turned fifteen, and I was sixteen-and-a-half. That had been a long day in our […]
Continue readingStories: Past, Present, and Future
A week ago when I posted, my father was alive. He was a regular reader of my blog, and often called or emailed me when I posted about family issues. He didn’t call me to comment on last Monday’s post about my grandparents’ house. But he did email me on […]
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