Sisters Make the Best Friends

A sister is both your mirror – and your opposite. (Elizabeth Fishel)

Do you have a sister? Perhaps if not a biological sister, then a sister of the heart? My sisters are both. We grew up together out on the farm and now are bound by more than memories but also by love. I daresay nobody can know you as well as a sister can. I am blessed that my sisters live in the same area as I do so that we can get together to keep the ties close.

My mother also had sisters, no brothers, the same as me. She had three sisters, blessed with one more than I had. After she got dementia, it was the sisters, who had all passed away by then, that she most wanted to be with. They were a foursome. The youngest one died first of a rare blood disorder. Mom and the other sisters were always there for her – to take her to the doctor, to laugh and try to lift her spirits when the medicine she had to take messed up how she looked, to encourage her when she had to have transfusions or when she was too weak to do the things she loved. They went to lunch together. They played cards, usually canasta, and Scrabble. They loved to read and liked working all sorts of puzzles from crosswords to jigsaws. They were always ready to be cheerleaders for each others’ kids. Here they are showing up at my very first book signing back in 1978. And oh how they loved to laugh and talk about their growing up years. They were the best of friends.

That’s how I feel about my sisters too. They are the best friends and I know that should I need their help, they would be ready to do whatever they could for me. One of my sisters had some outpatient surgery this week and I was her chauffeur since she couldn’t drive herself to the hospital or doctor. My other sister had the misfortune to catch the flu and had to stay away. The surgery went well. The sister with the flu is feeling better, and I’m home again to walk Frankie. (As an aside, I walked a different way with him today. He ran off to sniff something. I walked on. He didn’t catch up. I thought maybe I’d lost him, but he had high-tailed it back to the house when he lost my trail and missed out on most of the walk. That Frankie!) Oh, and my sisters come and walk with me sometimes too as you can see in this picture. Two of us are rock collectors and are always carrying home rocks. 

Back to sisters. It was because of the stories my mother told about growing up with her sisters that inspired me to write my Rosey Corner books, Angel Sister, Small Town Girl, and Love Comes Home about four sisters. The sister relationship is one that many writers have explored, and I liked writing about sisters based on my mother and her sisters. The stories are different but I think I managed to pull in the right relationship feeling because I heard about her sisters and I knew my own sisters.

Of course, I’ve also written several books about Shaker sisters. A bit different relationship, but the sister feeling was bound to be there with the Shakers as they lived together, worked together and worshiped together.

What about you? Do you have sisters who are your best friends? Do you like to read stories about sisters?

Sister is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship. (Margaret Mead)