It is true what they say. You really don’t know someone until you live with them. This saying best sums up my sentiment toward my sister.
My sister is 10 years older than me. She moved away from home when I was about five or six. I don’t have many memories of her living at home. After she moved out I would visit her sometimes, but we were never very close.
At 16 when I moved away from my mother I went to live with her. It worked out well in one respect. She worked as a flight attendant and would often be out of the country for days or weeks at a time.
My opinion of my sister can be best summed up by describing her favorite comment and her favorite pastime.
My sister would often make the comment, “No, I’m not racist. I feel everybody should own one.” The meaning of that being, everybody should own a black slave.
Her favorite pastime on weekends would be to make breakfast and then watch television. There were a lot of famines in Africa in 1989 and 1990. The famine that was getting the most attention in 1990 was going on in Ethiopia. Relief agencies had many pledge drives to raise money for food to send over there. They would air the most disturbing video of starving children, looking like concentration camp victims. These kids would be just skin and bones, with hollow looks in their eyes and flies buzzing around their heads. My sister would eat cereal, watch that and laugh hysterically.
This was not so much a revelation for me as it was a confirmation. Growing up I always knew my family was not as wholesome as the Cleavers. And although I wanted to believe I was the sane one growing up in their midst, I could no longer deny that they were rubbing off on me.
I stewed over that dream for eight months in 1990, between February and September, before I finally cracked. Eating cereal and laughing while children die of starvation may sound cruel. But not visiting a girl in the hospital when asked was for me, just as bad.
On September 29, 1990, I got together with my best friend at the time, Mark Gregory, and he gave me a ride to the Greyhound Bus Terminal. I was 17-years-old. I said goodbye to him and never looked back. I have not been back to Mississauga. I have been estranged from my family ever since.
My sister is 10 years older than me. She moved away from home when I was about five or six. I don’t have many memories of her living at home. After she moved out I would visit her sometimes, but we were never very close.
At 16 when I moved away from my mother I went to live with her. It worked out well in one respect. She worked as a flight attendant and would often be out of the country for days or weeks at a time.
My opinion of my sister can be best summed up by describing her favorite comment and her favorite pastime.
My sister would often make the comment, “No, I’m not racist. I feel everybody should own one.” The meaning of that being, everybody should own a black slave.
Her favorite pastime on weekends would be to make breakfast and then watch television. There were a lot of famines in Africa in 1989 and 1990. The famine that was getting the most attention in 1990 was going on in Ethiopia. Relief agencies had many pledge drives to raise money for food to send over there. They would air the most disturbing video of starving children, looking like concentration camp victims. These kids would be just skin and bones, with hollow looks in their eyes and flies buzzing around their heads. My sister would eat cereal, watch that and laugh hysterically.
This was not so much a revelation for me as it was a confirmation. Growing up I always knew my family was not as wholesome as the Cleavers. And although I wanted to believe I was the sane one growing up in their midst, I could no longer deny that they were rubbing off on me.
I stewed over that dream for eight months in 1990, between February and September, before I finally cracked. Eating cereal and laughing while children die of starvation may sound cruel. But not visiting a girl in the hospital when asked was for me, just as bad.
On September 29, 1990, I got together with my best friend at the time, Mark Gregory, and he gave me a ride to the Greyhound Bus Terminal. I was 17-years-old. I said goodbye to him and never looked back. I have not been back to Mississauga. I have been estranged from my family ever since.
