These three.
Sisters.
They don’t realize now, as they play in the yard and dress up in fancy clothes, as they play catch and jump on the trampoline, that they are doing so much more than playing.
That they are creating their backstory. That this is the story and these are the times that will forever bind them.
They don’t know that who they are is helping to shape who the other two are.
They don’t realize that they will be as defined by each other as much as they will by any other relationship in their lives.
They don’t realize that through the years they will laugh at each others jokes and cry at each others heartbreak.
Or that they may sometimes cry at the others’ jokes and laugh at their heartbreaks.
Because sometimes sisters just do that.
I read recently an article where someone pointed out that no one in our entire lives will be there as much as our siblings are. Our parents leave us too early and our spouses and children come too late.
But siblings are there through it all.
One day they will cry as the others head off to college.
One day they will dance at each others’ weddings.
One day they will show up at a hospital with a teddy bear and a giant hug for their new arrivals.
One day they will laugh at the moments of joy they had.
And they will laugh at the times TJ and I just didn’t understand.
One day they will fight the others’ battles when they cannot fight their own.
And one day they will fight each other in battles that are never really won.
But today they sit and play. And make memories. And create the yesterdays that will live like faded photographs in their memories of their youth.
Because no one else in this big, giant world will ever know what it is like to grow up here, with us, with each other, in this time and place.
.
These three.
Sisters.
If only they knew right now all of what that means.
