There is a hole in my life that is glaringly obvious despite all of the good things going on. My move, my new relationship with my guy and The Bee entering Middle School Madness has all been dimmed due to a rift between my sister and I.
I can’t say for sure what brought it on. Buffy has been dispensing her particular brand of cold for a few weeks now. We haven’t had an ‘our’ type of conversation in a while. I actually had text messages left over last billing cycle! Unsure of what the drama is from my end (and I have heard through the Fagg Jungle drums she is not mad at me and isn’t sure what my deal is) we have both been avoiding each other, speaking only when absolutely necessary and basically running quiet parallel lives. It’s been weird, such as when she stops by my job and ignores me, stops by Mom’s and ignores me and doesn’t keep me in the loop for mutual friend type things…and ignores me.
Anywho, one of the things that I know she is pissy about is me not reciprocating in the babysitting department. I won’t lie. Pop can come pretty much visit as much as she wants. Funky teenage attitude aside, she is easy peasy to be around. She requires little from me, can do as I ask and doesn’t really cause to much of a ruckus. Now my nephew…I love him but he gets on my nerves a bit. We’re a quiet house, we chill and watch tv, read books, play Barbies (well, The Bee does) and there is a general calm. Dill is like a bull in a china shop; loud, bumping into everything, falling, spilling things, banging into stuff and almost like The Tasmanian Devil. In fact, Leaky originally called HIM Dillzilla (my sis calls Leaky’s kid Arzilla) due to his ability to fall, knock something over, spill something etc during visits.
There is also the mutual understanding enjoyed by The Bee and I. There are Mommy type things that I should and will do and then there are The Bee type things that she should and does on her own. Dill is a bit more needier, messier and louder. But I swallowed most of my judgemental witchiness and last night I invited Dill and Pop over to spend the night.
My aha moment came when after a First circlish Hell type visit to Best Buy (our sales clerk TJ was awesome; the wait was boo!) we arrived home and The Bee played hostess to her cousins. I was ashamed and saddened that my bullheaded pride had caused her to not spend time with her best friends as well as I missed them*. As I watched her do everything she could to make them comfortable, I felt just awful that they had not been over to hang with us, stay up late eating junk food and that I allowed the rift that will surely be forgotten to interfere with what was best for the kids.
I wish I could say that I reached out to my sister today**. I was friendly toward her but we still aren’t at that gossip, chat and hang stage. I guess my aha moment is as evolving as ever and I am but I do know that the look on The Bee’s face was enough to make me rethink my silence and to reach out with a ‘Hello’
Being the best me,
-r
*In spite of Dill knocking over a can of cream soda and spilling chips on my floor.
**What had happened was I had to get to work [shifty side eyes]
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