Happy Birthday Sis

Today is my older sister's birthday, and we're going to Green Mill tonight to celebrate. When I think of my sister, I think of what an influence she was on me growing up. Things I knew when I was, say, six years old, I knew because my sister knew. Like how Ann-Margret was in a terrible accident. She looked so pretty, I thought, but my sister said you could still see the scar. I also knew who the Beatles were, and even learned to like a lot of their songs, long before most of my friends did, who mostly got to know them when John Lennon was killed.

What's amazing to me still today is that she was quite young to know all of this stuff, too. How many eleven-year-olds today know what's going on in the world aas well as my sister did? And I'm not just talking about pop culutre, either, although that was a large part of it. I suppose it makes sense, though, as she did graduate number one in a large metro school. She has the ability and smarts to do anything; I just wish she'd believe it.

My sister used to also share with me what she was learning in school, which gave me quite a head start. I think that's largely why I had enough people fooled into thinking I was some kind of academic prodigy, and why I skipped the second grade.

I remember one time in a music studies class, a fellow student commented how sad it is today (this was in 1991) that music isn't a "family thing" like it had been for our ancestors. The professor asked for anyone in the class to comment on anything music-related from our youth. I raised my hand and said, "The Partridge Family!"
"And what about the Partridge Family do you remember?," he asked.
"Well...my sister and I..."
"You see?," he asked the fellow student.
"Yeah, but," she started to respond, without really being able to finish.

I still like the Partridge Family, thanks to my sister (and I don't hold that against her one bit!) I especially like the fact that, at 42, I have memories most people five years older than me do not. And when I'm reminded of them, right away I think of my sister.

Happy Brithday, Sis!