Sisters

Despite the fact that my sister and I hold differing political views, differing religious views, and different tastes in clothes, fashion, and food, I love my relationship with my sister for the following reasons.

In the middle of the day, I can call her from Walmart (which she dislikes for ideological purposes), because I want advice on whether or not to purchase a $10 pair of grey cloth Mary Jane shoes. Rather than a lecture about child labor in China, my sister will enter into a serious discussion with me regarding the types and colors of socks I would need to purchase to go with my ten dollar shoes.

Similarly, I can call her after bringing home a five dollar black pleather jacket from the thrift shop. Not only is she all about the advice regarding a good hat choice, but she emails me a list of photo links of hats that will work with that jacket.

She understands the significance of the shape of the icicles hanging outside my kitchen window.

She laughs at my blog.

She loves my children and will listen to all my stories without tiring.

She can face-paint a cockateil based on a little girl's description that it "goes like this".

When Sarah Palin bombed during the vice-presidential debate, she said, "I'm so sorry," rather than, "I told you so."

She gets teary-eyed looking at a Chihuly.

She pretends that I'm a good garden designer.

When asked, "I'm reading a book about God; what's a fractal?" She's happy to launch into a detailed, but understandable, explanation of fractals without batting an eye.

Look, kids, art.

She understands that Eden Park is indeed thin space.

She joins me in my rant against Stephanie Meyer.

She doesn't join me on Team Jacob.

I can communicate with her in a look, and she grasps what I'm conveying.

She makes a phenomenal cup of hot cocoa.

When I say "virtual" instead of "vicarious", she doesn't correct me. She just uses the correct word in the correct context in her next sentence.

She taught herself how to be an excellent cook despite my attempts to mentor her in the kitchen when she was a teenager.

She doesn't care how many participles I leave dangling. At least to my face ;)

She spent an entire weekend stripping wall paper and spreading textured paint in a 5 x 7 space on very little sleep to help the Jedi surprise me with a redecorated bathroom.

For the Superbowl, she made little gormet appetizers that I can neither pronounce nor even google. (They were little date things stuffed with a cheese I can't name wrapped in a type of bacon and broiled.) For the same Superbowl, I reheated Skyline chili and scorched my attempt at caramelized popcorn.

She sends me links to cool dance videos. She doesn't get upset when it takes me forever to get around to watching them.

She sees the artistic merit of "rectangles of color".

She tells me about The Pioneer Woman.

She'll totally support me in my leap-without-looking scheme to take on the assignments at P.W. Photography. She'll probably volunteer to do them with me.

She totally supported me in my leap-without-looking scheme to participate in NaNo. She immediately volunteered to do it with me.

I'm sure as soon as I walk away from the computer, many more things will leap to mind. Just as I'm sure that I had a few other things in mind before I sat down at the computer, which now I can't recall. Still, it's a good sampling of the things I like about, so I'll stop fretting over it. Instead I'll fret over the extraordinarily loud crash which just happened upstairs.