K is for Sisters, What Else?

I'm doing the A-to-Z Blog Challenge.

Today is for K, and K is for my sisters, whose names all begin with the letter "K."

Out of respect for their privacy, I'm not going to post their names, but I will say this:

One sister's name rhymes with what, for me, was the most awkward class in elementary school.

Another sister's name rhymes with something that tastes good with peanut butter.

And the other sister's name rhymes with a type of weather. (And if you mispronounce it like a baby might, it could rhyme with the name of an insect blamed for rural poverty in sub-Sarahan Africa.)


We don't have any brothers, and I am the youngest by more than six years.

Translation: I spent a lot of my childhood hearing the phrase, "Mom, she's in our stuff again."

Each of them has a career in medicine, so a lot of our holiday dinner discussions usually end up gravitating toward bodily fluids and woeful tales of medical non-compliance and the insurance companies that won't pay for it.

Our holiday dinner discussions also sometimes gravitate toward amusing memories from our childhood ...

Like the time I fell down the stairs and got rolled up in the plastic runner.

Or the time my better judgment escaped me and I got my head stuck between the iron spindles of the back porch railing.

Or the time our parents forgot to order a meal for me when we went to a fancy restaurant after church one Sunday.

Or that one time in Colorado when then age-old question about where a bear chooses to defecate almost hit painfully close to home for yours truly.

Hmm...I notice a pattern forming here. It seems as if my sisters got a lot of laughter at my expense.

I'm sure they will tell you it's because, as the youngest, I enjoyed being the center of attention.

But I enjoyed their company just as much, so when each of them graduated and moved out, it got pretty lonely at our house in the country. (That's when my love for writing began to blossom.)

My sisters are still pretty awesome. I could spend all night in front of a computer mulling over how best to use this space to talk about them.

Instead, I think I'll just use this post to thank them.

For all of the times they let me play Barbies or dolls or Little Peoples with them.

For the times they let me come over to the fort in the neighbor's tree and helped me onto the monkey swing.

For introducing me to the best damn era of music the world has ever experienced.

For not throwing the daddy long leg bodies at me.

For letting me hang out by them in the basement when their friends were over.

For water fights

and snowball fights

and unclamping that curling iron from Princess's tail (it wasn't hot)

and dumping rainwater out of the tire swing so we could play rocketship

and teaching me how to ride a bike and taking me to Maskenthine Lake on hot summer days

and doing all of the fun stuff that sisters do.

And especially for putting up with me when I post old, goofy photos of us on the Internet.

I only do it because I love ya.

Now stop telling me I'm spoiled.

* * *

Kathryn Harris is an award-winning journalist and author of the contemporary novel THE LONG ROAD TO HEAVEN. All royalties she receives from April 2016's online sales of The Long Road to Heaven will be donated in memory of the late Caylee Hoehne to the United Way for use with the Court Appointed Special Advocates program for abused and neglected children. Please consider helping this worthwhile cause.