They too, trust you and depend on you to help mold their plyable minds to be just like you.
As the eldest of three girls, all I have to say is, my poor sisters. I have story after story where I would use my creativity as an outlet to just torment them for no other reason than because I could.
Stacy always had it bad, next in line and three years apart, Stacy and I would fight, and was a constant target for my abuse.
My mother tells the story of how just a few days out of the hospital, Mom was changing Stacy's diaper with me right by her side when she had a phone call. Now these are the days before cordless phones and she had to step out of the room for just a moment, only to come back and see Stacy coated in baby powder and the empty container placed in my hands.
Fast forward two years, Stacy now a toddler and my mom almost full term with our youngest sister Paula and completely miserable and exhausted.
My mom who, I believe, to this day is part of a social experiement to see how long a human can work before being institutionalized, and preparing to give birth soon. She was a super hero by all rights.
She had just recently cleaned the house for the 15 minutes before Stacy and I trashed it like a couple of rock stars in a 5 star hotel. And was in the mood for a much needed rest. So she placed a lawn chair on the front lawn, and had the keys in the ignition of our station wagon, the vehicle of choice for most of my childhood, and listened to music as we played in the yard.
I asked if I could play house in the car with Stacy, and in my mother's half comatose state she agreed, I believe if only for the brief moment of peace and quiet.
So, I corralled my 2 year old sister into her car seat, to which she happily agreed. Obivously as the older sister she should be completely safe in my care.
I went around to the driver seat and began to mimick my mother. I would turn the wheel back and forth and say the key phrases that all adults would use to insure the car ride went properly.
"Don't think I won't come back there!" " Have you ever heard of a turn signal?!" "If you say mom one more time..."
"Where should we go?" I finally asked Stacy knowing her broken toddler response would be the same as mine.
"McDonald's!" We would yell in unision. McDonald's was the tangiable Disney land for us lower class children growing up in Indiana. The happiest place of Earth in the 90's where you could get french fries, toys with your meal, and play in the ball pit. The ball pit filled with plastic balls and possible urine from the other children before you.
Something children of today with their nutritional happy meals and ball pit free McDonald's will never get to experience.
So I began our imaginary treck but became bored with the limited left and right turns I could make with the steering wheel, and decided to take another page from my mom's book and use the lever on the side of the wheel, moving it all the way over to little "N".
I should take the time, in this part of my story, to make you readers aware that our house at the time sat on a hilltop. Our driveway consisted of two concrete runways for the tires, leading up to the side of our house.
How impressed Stacy must have been by her big sister who was able to get the car to actually move just like our parents as we began to desend down our driveway.
My mom who had been resting peacefully up until this point in her lawn chair, looked up to see her two daughters heading out on their very first road trip together.
She bolted out of her chair and with my almost fully formed fetus sister Paula in tow came waddling/ running after us.
I panicked. I was not prepared for this as a newly self proclaimed adult. Stacy also sensing my distress begin to cry.
Mom waddling side to side screamed, "HIT THE BRAKE, HIT THE BRAKE!"
So I began our imaginary treck but became bored with the limited left and right turns I could make with the steering wheel, and decided to take another page from my mom's book and use the lever on the side of the wheel, moving it all the way over to little "N".
I should take the time, in this part of my story, to make you readers aware that our house at the time sat on a hilltop. Our driveway consisted of two concrete runways for the tires, leading up to the side of our house.
How impressed Stacy must have been by her big sister who was able to get the car to actually move just like our parents as we began to desend down our driveway.
My mom who had been resting peacefully up until this point in her lawn chair, looked up to see her two daughters heading out on their very first road trip together.
She bolted out of her chair and with my almost fully formed fetus sister Paula in tow came waddling/ running after us.
I panicked. I was not prepared for this as a newly self proclaimed adult. Stacy also sensing my distress begin to cry.
Mom waddling side to side screamed, "HIT THE BRAKE, HIT THE BRAKE!"
To which I too screamed in reply, "WHAT'S A BREAK?!"
We were down now in the street a car, only a few feet behind us. As mom had finally caught up with us.
"It's the one on the left, hit the pedal on the left!" She yelled over Stacy's wailing in the back seat.
I slammed down on the brake as hard as I could, just half a second before hitting our neighbors car.
I scrambled out of the car and back up the hill, prolonging the pain that would soon meet my back side, and watched as my mother effortlessly drove the car back in place all the while never breaking her death stare with me.
Allthough I had placed all 3 of our lives in danger, one of whom had not made it out of the womb, and the punishment was not something I would look back on with cherished memories. I can look back fondly on the first time I drove, and had quite a story for school the next day.
-Amber
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