The simple truth is that on my own, I will probably never be able to escape how fucked up I am.
Of course, my brother would also never recognize how much of it is his fault. EDIT: More accurately: it's hard to say how much responsibility he would accept for me turning out the way I am.
It has been my observation that siblings born either
1) within a couple of years of each other, or
2) with roughly 7 or more years between them,
tend to have more fruitful relationships.
Before a certain age, a child lacks the self-awareness to want to monopolize affection. As far as the older sibling is concerned, the younger one has basically 'always been there'.
In the latter case, once the child has reached the so-called "age of reason" (this can be before or after 7 years, although that is accepted to be the average age it starts) and develops a conscience and rational thinking, it seems logical to have a positive relationship with the younger sibling. So this is what I have seen.
Neither was the case with my brother and I. He came through 4.5 years before I did, around 2.5 years after my sister. As far as I know, they got along fine until I was there, and from what I recall of my childhood, my sister usually was there to defend me from him. When she left to go to university, he could exercise all the power in our small world.
This is not to say that we didn't have our positive moments. I'm almost certain we did. But the sad fact is that if we did, it's all buried under this vast mountain of unhappy experiences, and I can barely dig myself out. I kept to myself so much that I didn't know what 'spooning' actually meant until I was around 20. And I certainly never experienced it until I was half past 21, which was the first time I initiated a kiss. (I'd received a kiss once - just once - before that. When I was 16. Lovely girl, wonderful friend. I was shell-shocked and basically froze up completely.)
My brother would often hang out with a girl from my year who was in the choir with him. He would give her private piano lessons in the main living room - and I seem to remember he would always get inordinately upset whenever I had to get something from the room while he was in there with her, even if it just took a matter of seconds. I don't think I understood why until just a couple of years ago.
I don't know if I was born an introvert, but I learned from him, early on, that trying something I had never tried before was a bad idea. I learned that there was knowledge I was not meant to have, because it was only for the worthy (and for people older than me). I learned that if I ever competed for anything in any way, ever, I would always lose (with the only stupid exception of dumb luck in my favor).
Maybe I was a brat. In fact I'm pretty sure I was. Most children are born that way - they have to demand attention in order to survive. I remember I would get my parents to shout at him because "his butt was pointing at me". Both of my parents worked full-time, so I doubt they had much willpower to spare on correcting me - it was just easier to shout at my brother to do something as simple as turn his body around.
Not necessarily related: I went to the same school for nine years. This school was boys/girls segregated. Not a horrible thing, and not too surprising for a Catholic school. Genders could mix before or after school, which was fine. I never met a large percentage of the girls in my own year ... until 6 months before we all graduated. This was partly due to the fact that I took public transportation rather than the school buses (which were not actually owned/run by the school). There was a girl (who is quite a stunning woman today) who lived in the next apartment block over from mine, and went to the same school, in the same grade as me, for pretty much the same length of time - and I don't recall that I even knew her name until my final year of school.
There was another girl who I used to have childhood play-dates with. She could be a supermodel, these days. We could have grown up together to be best friends, even, who knows. I recall that there were times we played games which would seem creepy or sexual to an adult mindset - but I fail to see how we could have intended that at the time, seeing as both of us were less than 10 years old. Still, over the years we drifted apart, and occasionally when we'd meet I'd make oblique references to our childhood play-dates. I never thought of it as creepy - I learned later from a mutual friend that (possibly due to her upbringing) she likely took it much more seriously than I'd imagine. I haven't seen her in years now, and, not for the first or the last time, I wonder what could have been if I'd been more mindful, or less ... myself.
It has been my observation that siblings born either
1) within a couple of years of each other, or
2) with roughly 7 or more years between them,
tend to have more fruitful relationships.
Before a certain age, a child lacks the self-awareness to want to monopolize affection. As far as the older sibling is concerned, the younger one has basically 'always been there'.
In the latter case, once the child has reached the so-called "age of reason" (this can be before or after 7 years, although that is accepted to be the average age it starts) and develops a conscience and rational thinking, it seems logical to have a positive relationship with the younger sibling. So this is what I have seen.
Neither was the case with my brother and I. He came through 4.5 years before I did, around 2.5 years after my sister. As far as I know, they got along fine until I was there, and from what I recall of my childhood, my sister usually was there to defend me from him. When she left to go to university, he could exercise all the power in our small world.
This is not to say that we didn't have our positive moments. I'm almost certain we did. But the sad fact is that if we did, it's all buried under this vast mountain of unhappy experiences, and I can barely dig myself out. I kept to myself so much that I didn't know what 'spooning' actually meant until I was around 20. And I certainly never experienced it until I was half past 21, which was the first time I initiated a kiss. (I'd received a kiss once - just once - before that. When I was 16. Lovely girl, wonderful friend. I was shell-shocked and basically froze up completely.)
My brother would often hang out with a girl from my year who was in the choir with him. He would give her private piano lessons in the main living room - and I seem to remember he would always get inordinately upset whenever I had to get something from the room while he was in there with her, even if it just took a matter of seconds. I don't think I understood why until just a couple of years ago.
I don't know if I was born an introvert, but I learned from him, early on, that trying something I had never tried before was a bad idea. I learned that there was knowledge I was not meant to have, because it was only for the worthy (and for people older than me). I learned that if I ever competed for anything in any way, ever, I would always lose (with the only stupid exception of dumb luck in my favor).
Maybe I was a brat. In fact I'm pretty sure I was. Most children are born that way - they have to demand attention in order to survive. I remember I would get my parents to shout at him because "his butt was pointing at me". Both of my parents worked full-time, so I doubt they had much willpower to spare on correcting me - it was just easier to shout at my brother to do something as simple as turn his body around.
Not necessarily related: I went to the same school for nine years. This school was boys/girls segregated. Not a horrible thing, and not too surprising for a Catholic school. Genders could mix before or after school, which was fine. I never met a large percentage of the girls in my own year ... until 6 months before we all graduated. This was partly due to the fact that I took public transportation rather than the school buses (which were not actually owned/run by the school). There was a girl (who is quite a stunning woman today) who lived in the next apartment block over from mine, and went to the same school, in the same grade as me, for pretty much the same length of time - and I don't recall that I even knew her name until my final year of school.
There was another girl who I used to have childhood play-dates with. She could be a supermodel, these days. We could have grown up together to be best friends, even, who knows. I recall that there were times we played games which would seem creepy or sexual to an adult mindset - but I fail to see how we could have intended that at the time, seeing as both of us were less than 10 years old. Still, over the years we drifted apart, and occasionally when we'd meet I'd make oblique references to our childhood play-dates. I never thought of it as creepy - I learned later from a mutual friend that (possibly due to her upbringing) she likely took it much more seriously than I'd imagine. I haven't seen her in years now, and, not for the first or the last time, I wonder what could have been if I'd been more mindful, or less ... myself.
No comments:
Post a Comment