If you know our pretty big family, you may be wondering if that was something that happened because my husband and I wanted our new family to be like the ones we grew up in. Well, it didn’t really occur to me because I really hoped for better..
I was raised with a sister and a brother, though from my point of view, this fact was rarely an asset in my life. Rennie was born only 13 months after I was, and then after two unsuccessful pregnancies, my mother gave birth to a boy, who was promptly named after my father and encumbered with a “Jr.” suffix. I say “encumbered” because that was the only name we used for him – or some derivation like “Junebug,” “Junie,” or “Junabaker.” Rennie was just Rennie (pronounced “ree’-nee”).
My earliest memories of Rennie are the pictures in our family albums. One Christmas, Rennie and I received twin dolls, and you can see the two of us in the black and white picture side-by-side with our dolls.
I do remember being left alone in the car with Rennie once, while Mom went shopping at the commissary. I don’t think she was gone too long, but what little child has never “driven” a car when left alone in one. Every knob and dial must be explored! There was no such thing as a child restraint back in the day, so explore we did. One knob I first pushed in, and then pulled completely out, having no idea what it was. Rennie wanted it, so I put it in her hand. She howled and I got in trouble. That’s when I learned about cigarette lighters. (Every car had one.)
Next, I remember when my mom repainted my baby bed blue, to be given to an intruder – some other kid who would be coming to live with us. I was not thrilled about the loss of my bed, but it was not to be helped. When Dan came, his birth was difficult. Grandpa wasn’t happy that so soon after two miscarriages, his daughter had given birth to a baby boy so huge that he messed up her reproductive system. His famous line was, “What are you trying to do? Populate the State of California?” And this baby was really big! I never thought he looked particularly cute and tiny – he was just big and heavy.
From then on, sibling rivalry was the name of the game in our family. I always blamed it on the number “3” because I noticed that it was always two against one. It was only later that I really understood that it was always the two of them against the one of me. Only a few times did either Rennie or Junior take my part. The rest of the time, there was a lot of teasing of Margie going on in that trailer. My sibs told me they were exercising their pinchers so they could be strong enough to pinch me really hard, like little crabs, and they called me names, constantly, mercilessly. My mom and dad laughed when they heard the names, though. I knew I couldn’t hit the siblings, so instead I just whined and tattled on them.
There were two main problems with the relationship between myself and my brother and sister. First, my parents made the mistake of telling them, as they left home, that “Margie is in charge. Do what she says, and she’s going to tell me when we get home if you’ve been good or bad. If she tells me you’ve been bad, you will get spanked.” Not only did that not work, it also made them act up worse than ever. As soon as my parents left, the two of them immediately determined that they would do all they could to be as bad as possible. They told me, “We don’t have to do what YOU say, Margie,” followed by loud raspberries.
Once, when my brother was being particularly nerve wracking, I tried locking him outside – in Arizona, during the summer, during the hot part of the day. That made things a little more peaceful inside … except for all the melodramatic yelling and banging on the door. I unlocked that door when Mom got home and feigned innocence, but since Junior was certain he was going to die from sister brutality, he didn’t let me forget the incident.
The other problem was the fact that some of my teachers had my siblings in their classes and hoped aloud that they were just as smart and sweet as I was. That meant that my siblings always felt like they were being constantly confused with or compared to me. So, early on, they decided that they needed to choose the opposite direction from everything I did, in order to avoid all comparison. That meant that I stopped having any opportunities to sing with my siblings. They said, “No, Margie, that’s what you do, That’s not for me.” Instead, they chose photography or something else totally different.
The closest I ever got to Rennie was when I went to the 10th grade Christmas formal with a shy kid named Perry. My sister told me how important it was for me to kiss him at the end of the evening. She was delighted to instruct me on how to apply make-up and pluck my eyebrows. I was to show Perry to the outside porch door with the excuse of needing to lock it after him. Then I should stand there, looking seductive, and wait for him to kiss me. Since she’d been kissing boys since third grade and was so experienced, I took my lessons, practiced on mirrors, and promised to give it a try…
Perry, if you ever read this, I’m so sorry about that!
Meanwhile, Junior just seemed to be a weenie. The year I began my junior year in high school (11th grade), Junior was starting 7th grade. He needed to ride the bus to school for the first time. I know he was hoping I would save him from the high school bullies who were teasing him, but I halfway thought, well, he teases me all the time, so he’s getting what he deserves. I further rationalized that he really needed to learn to stand up to the bullies by himself. They’ll only tease him worse if Big Sister comes to the rescue. So I held my peace, and Junior cried.
And one day, being very weary of his constant teasing about my being fat, I finally did some quick calculations, estimated the odds, and took a chance.
“OH YEAH?” I countered. “When you are my age, you will weigh more than I do!”
“OH YEAH?”
“YEAH!”
“BET ON IT!”
“YOU’RE ON!” I took out pencil and paper.
“What’s that?”
“I’m getting this in writing. Here, sign your name.”
It was a $20.00 bet. I had to wait three and a half years to collect on it, but it gave me pleasure to keep reminding him that on a certain date, we would see if he was fatter than I was. By that time, he was much taller than I was at his age, and I was not merciful.
When our family moved to California near Grandpa Ware and Grandma Pearl, we were leaving behind a really good high school in Arizona. My grandparents tried to answer our questions before we moved, but every time I asked about whether we’d be going to a good school, I would just hear, “Well, you’ll have to go to Artesia like everybody else, unless you can afford a private school.” Of course, that wasn’t my call to make.
Our parents bought a house in Hawaiian Gardens just off the 605 Freeway. Grandpa Ware said he would paint the rooms whatever color we wanted them. I had to share a room with Rennie and she thought it should be painted black, so she could line her side of the room with her black light posters and they would glow in the dark. I wanted our room to be hot pink, with a thick fuzzy white carpet. Consequently, the room was painted white. We had to be content with shelving and bean bag chairs in our desired colors.
In the mornings, the record player we shared was in dispute, so we hit upon a compromise agreement. I would listen to “Come Together” to learn the words for the Youth Choir musical (see my last post) while Rennie was in the shower, and then she would listen to Black Sabbath or Led Zeppelin while I was in the shower.
But I was hardly home anyway, with a schedule that included many and varied extracurricular activities. After school, my mom was working at an insurance company, and I was working at Aunt Jackie’s Hawaiian Shoppe. Rennie and Junior came home from school and didn’t have any big sister to babysit them, so they ended up getting in trouble. Sometimes I did come home, and it was clear that my siblings had been smoking. They didn’t hide it very well – the giveaway was that the smoke got sucked right into the house through the open window.
Rennie and I both signed up for Advanced Drama when we got to the new school, and we ended up in the same class. (The only time ever!) Since there actually was no official “Advanced Drama” class, the teacher just told us to work together to write a play while he taught the rest of the students. We were then to recruit actors to play the roles, and direct the play. That was our only assignment for the semester – and it was a mistake. Rennie and I were not really well suited for a collaborative project. So we fought over the writing of the play until she said, “You just write it, Margie. I’m leaving.” Then she actually played hooky and left me to write it by myself.
Rennie and Junior always refused to go with me to the Youth Group at the Baptist Church or to get involved in any church stuff. On Sundays, they were required to go to the Naval Air Station Chapel at Los Alamitos where our parents went after dad retired, but that was under protest. Mom said they got saved and baptized there, but that apparently happened after I left home, and I don’t think it “worked” very well.
But once, Rennie tried to renew our closeness by inviting me to come along with her to a party at a neighbor’s house. She said she wanted me to meet her friends. I had no idea it was a pot party, but I thought I would try to be friendly anyway. Sitting in a circle, a joint made its way around, but when it was put into my hands, I moved it along to the next participant. Rennie was very much offended that I would refuse her friends’ hospitality, but the friend told her to chill – it was cool if I didn’t want a drag on the joint – that left more for everybody else.
And then there was the incident where, walking home from work one evening, I saw fire trucks at our house. The whole driveway was wet, and the neighbors’ driveways were dry, similar to the fleece of Gideon (Judges 6:36-40). I was thinking there must have been a fire while I was away, so I was terrified. But the firemen were just finishing cleaning up and were getting ready to leave. They had to wash off the blood from the porch where Jerry, Rennie’s latest low-life boyfriend, had slit his wrists to show her how much he loved her after she broke up with him. His reasoning was, if he couldn’t have Rennie, he would just have to commit suicide – right there in front of her.
Dad had to build a room off the back of our house so I didn’t have to share a room with Rennie. The conflicts were too great and too often. But the room Dad built was on the other side of the large picture window at the back of the house. There was still no privacy because if I retreated to my room to escape my brother, he would simply open the drapes and continue ranting and cursing through the glass.
I left for Air Force Basic Military Training in 1974, in October just after my birthday. Like others who have joined the military after growing up in less than perfect circumstances, I was actually glad to get away. For my 18th birthday, Junior got me a really large white stuffed mouse, and I loved it! It was the best thing he’d ever done for me. I named him Barrymore and he had a place of honor in my life. It looked like Junior might actually miss me!
Perhaps a year went by, and then suddenly I got a letter from him! I was excited!
“Dear Margie,” read the letter, “I just wanted to break my silence to tell you why you haven’t heard from me.
“It’s just just that I can’t stand you because you’re such a self-righteous, hypocritical pig! You’ll probably never hear from me again.”
That was news – I thought he was just being irresponsible! It was so edifying I could hardly stand it. But things have never gotten any better, even after all these years…
There are striking differences between me and my siblings, till it’s hard to truly grasp that they emerged from the same womb I did. I’m on the right, they’re on the left, and our universes keep drifting further in the opposite direction. This is what was set in motion when my siblings decided they had to be and do whatever was the opposite of Margie.
But thankfully, though the old adage “blood’s thicker than water,” doesn’t always hold up, Jesus’ promise to replace relatives does. As Believers in Christ, we are never alone. Besides Jesus Himself, the Friend who sticks closer than a brother (Prov. 18:24), I have been given brothers and sisters in the Lord, who are much closer than my blood kin, and with whom I would unhesitatingly trust my life. You’ll be meeting many of them in future posts.
“So Jesus answered and said, "Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My sake and the gospel's, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time –- houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions –- and in the age to come, eternal life.”
~Mark 10:29-30
Thank you, Jesus, for that promise! I am a member of Your forever family, and I have wonderful real siblings who love me and forgive my failings because they take after their merciful, forgiving Father. May we continue to grow closer to each other and to You.
For it is in Your Name we pray, Amen.
wow that is so hard that they would hate you so much. What does your dad think of this?
ReplyDeleteMy dad can't really understand what happened either. Dad and I are in the same universe -- the one where God is -- but Dan and Rennie are in a different one.
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