Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Sibling rivalry

Just came back from a fun filled vacation with my fiance and we got to visit lots of family. What could be better, right? Well, I guess a fun filled vacation on a sunny deserted island where we don't speak to anyone else but each other for two weeks, but I digress.

I was especially excited to go, since my cousin's wife just had their second child. The baby is an adorable little bundle of love and everyone adores her. Everyone, that is, but her older brother. Sure, he talks a good game-- "I'm a big brother now!" "I love my little sister!" "She's so beautiful!"-- but I couldn't help but notice that he tried to kill her once or twice. Okay, no, he didn't actually try to kill her, but he *did* ask me why on earth I wanted to sit around and hold her when I could go and play with him.

Oh dear.

I tried to explain to him that I, too, am an older sibling and being an older sibling rocks! He asked me why, exactly, being an older sibling rocks, and I couldn't think of one thing. Zip. Zippo. Nada. Which is strange, because I'm incredibly close with my brother. And I never once tried to kill him. (That I can remember.)

The whole thing made me think about siblings and your birth order in the family. I've always thought that your birth order in the family truly makes you who you are (in fact, in my writing classes, I urge students to think about where their characters fall in the birth order of the family).Where are you guys in the birth order of your families and how has that made you who you are today?

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