Just don't call him baby

When we were children, my older sister Denise, younger brother David and I were like any other set of siblings. We fussed and fought and hung out watching television and snacking until our mother got home from her job at the courthouse. David went through a phase where he always wanted to watch Popeye. Of course, it's not like there five hundred channels to choose from back in the 1970s so Denise and I suffered through Popeye to watch The Flintstones, Gilligan's Island and The Brady Bunch.

I am ashamed of how we treated David sometimes. He was just a little boy, but to us he was the enemy. He was the Godzilla stomping through Barbieland, the pencil wielding homicidal maniac who stabbed the rag bodies of baby dolls, the kid who scribbled over my neatly colored pages in coloring books, the hair puller when I hurled the epithet Baby David his direction. Yeah, I deserved that bald spot.

But when he sunk down in his red bean bag chair in front of the TV and uttered the words "will someone make me a PBJ," either Denise or I would make him one without even spitting on it. We loved him and his sweet dimpled cheeks. My first memory of him is when my mother rocked him as a baby swaddled in a blanket. I clung to the back of the chair my toes curled around the rocker's runners and we sang. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

Despite the horror of living with two older sisters and having survived the torture we bestowed upon him, Dave grew up to be a man I'm proud to call my brother. He's a great father, I hope he's a wonderful husband, he has an important job serving his community and he's a great son. He's a much better son than I am a daughter. He's also a talented graphic artist and now he's writing, too, about his love of the outdoors.

Aside from the crazy pride I feel for him, I also enjoy reading Dave's blog because it gives me insight into this man I grew up with, I get to see the past through his eyes. His perspective and experiences are unique.

As the only son and the youngest, Dave had a different relationship with our parents, especially with our father. They spent a lot of time together and while I don't want to give you the impression that it was all back-slapping manly jocularity, the two of them definitely shared interests, information and a language that none of us womenfolk (what?) understood.

When I see my own son Nate and my husband together, I have a better idea of what my brother's relationship is like with our father. Nate reminds me of David - impatient, energetic, occasionally hot-tempered, keenly observant, a deep thinker. At his core sensitive and kind with high expectations for justice. Sometimes when I'm not paying attention, I call Nathan by my brother's name.

Today our father turns seventy-five and Dave wrote a touching and funny post about Dad's influence on him. I wanted to share it with you because you all seem like part of the family, too.

I know, I'm sorry. You didn't ask to be part of this dysfunction, did you?

Also there's a post at that other blog.

Send in the Clowns........

A long time ago, when Darling Sis and I would try to slink away unnoticed from the dinner table to race down the hall and slam our bedroom door, locking out our little brother so we could play Barbies in peace, it never occurred to us that he would grow up to carry a gun for a living.

Had we known, we might have been more kind to his destructive, hair-pulling little boy self. Instead, we minced our precious plastic feminine icons around the elaborate homes we'd designed for them using a mishmash of Barbie specific items and things gleaned from our mother's vanity table.

Remember the Barbie Dream Home? It came with that plastic bed that always had a crack in it where you would pinch your finger. We used nail polish bottles for lamps, folded up Kleenex for pillows and we draped open tissues over the bed for covers. We even expanded our wasp-waisted dolls' living space through a DIY project worthy of its own television program. We made more rooms and hallways by pressing masking tape onto the hardwood floor - much to our mother's sour-faced displeasure.

Our poor little brother sat outside the locked bedroom door and cried and begged and demanded to be let in. When we were worn down enough to agree - with numerous conditions, of course - we were predictably disappointed as he would go tromping about, acting the Godzilla to our Barbies, messing things up, tipping things over and nibbling the toes of our Barbies when we were distracted with fussing and straightening the mess.

Or did we nibble those Barbie toes? Memory is such a subjective thing.....

Well, the joke is on us now that Baby Brother is the Chief of Police of our hometown. Godzilla is now the keeper of Law and Order. (And I'm dang proud of him, too.)

We were your typical siblings. Car trips were the usual nightmare with three surly kids. I still don't know why our parents punished themselves so. Back in those days, cars had bench seats and while Darling Sis and I had our traditional places in the back, we insisted the CoP ride up front between Mom and Dad. That didn't mean he couldn't get up on his knees and twist around in the seat so he could face us. Pest.

I used to make an ugly face at him using my fingers to pull my eyes down, my nose up and to stretch out my mouth into a hideous gaping maw. He would yelp and flail around in his seat. Darling Sis ignored us, Mom clucked her tongue in disgust and threatened to escape out the passenger door and Dad taught us new words and phrases we later found out via the piquant taste of Palmolive were not allowed.

Were the five of us to attempt car travel en masse now, I doubt much would be different.

I've written on my other blogs about a few incidents involving my brother, but one of my all time favorites was the time he was hypnotized at a school assembly and announced to the whole high school that he was afraid of clowns. Not a fan of clowns myself, I can understand this, but it was still a moment of high humor for my 18 year old self, being the smarty pants older sister that I was.
I'd forgotten until recently all the methodology I employed to frighten the CoP back then. I should apologize or something. First though, I want to tell you that I find it particularly amusing in a symmetrical kind of way that one of my favorite bloggers Bubs, who is also in law enforcement, posts often about clowns. I never miss an opportunity to crack wise about showing my brother the scary clown posts. And now, here's my chance. Hey - Chief of Police - whatever you do, don't look here.

Okay, now I really owe him an apology. And a dinner. And possibly a gift certificate to Bass World. Will that do?

This is fresh in my mind because we've had the chance to renew our kinship on Facebook. The Chief of Police was the last of the siblings to get a profile. But now he's there and we're all about the airing of dirty family laundry and reliving the stunning idiocy of life at 118 A Wilson Street circa 1969 - 1984.

Thankfully, our parents aren't involved. They are safely without a computer or knowledge of what goes on in cyberspace between their children. That is, of course, until one of the aunts who are on Facebook clues them in. The horror.

On the Chief of Police's Facebook wall......

Me: Seriously. Well, you're actually a pretty nice guy except when you're holding your sister in a half nelson. Have you seen the retro wrestler's favorites thing yet?

CoP: No...still trying to figure all the apps out on here...the wrestling stuff reminded me of the werewolf and hoobiedoobie man...hahahahahaha! Do you remember when you used to scare the crap out of me and then you'd be in for it!?!?

Me: Oh my gosh! I'd totally forgotten about the werewolf and the hoobiedoobie man! Yeah, I was pretty mean to you - scaring you like that. I guess it was only fair that you practiced your wrestling moves and holds on me.

Still - let's blame Darling Sis. She started it by hiding in the closet and jumping out and scaring me every chance she got.

CoP: She's an easy target...I say we blame her for everything!

Me: Deal.

Darling Sis: Oh hell no...don't even think of blaming any of that crap on me. Yes, I'll admit I hid in the closets (with camera in hand) and jumped out to scare Lisa. You'd think that as smart as Lisa was, she would have known I would jump out at her every chance that I got. I say blame CoP - isn't he the one who did the autopsy on your rag doll, Lisa? ... And what about the amputations to all the Barbies? Hmmmmm? ......

Me: I knew we'd get busted for this. Fine. Why don't we band together and blame the parents? Have you guys talked to them lately?.... P.S. Don't read the blog, CoP. I'm going to write about Clowns. With pictures.

Darling Sis: PS - while you two twits are talking about "the old times", remember "Georgie Porgie" (Lisa) and "Liggle-Diggle" (Lisa, again), "Clepto-Trashies" (Lisa again), and the best one, "Pr*ck of the Month Club" (yep, Lisa). Sorry I'm picking on Lisa here, but I .....

CoP: Ewwwwwwwww....Clowns are the creepiest EVER! There used to be a freakin' scary mask in the storage room that reminded me of a clown...hated it!!! Trust me...I have read waaaaaaay more on the blog than I should have! Just thankful that "mother and dad" don't have a computer!

Darling Sis: What is it with clowns? They scare (nephew) to death also. Took the kid to a circus and he freaked out in a major way. CoP - do you remember the old hag witch mask that we used to have at MOTHER's house? That was one gnarley looking thing.

Me: First - Thanks, Darling Sis, for noting more of our (my) childhood weirdness). Second - CoP, now that I know you're reading the blog (did you catch the video where I imitated mother eating the ice cream cone? that'll give you nightmares), I'll be sure to not identify you when I write about the hypnotist visiting the school assembly. Third - Hell, Darling Sis. The Dancer's 18. We're all getting old.

Darling Sis: Old? Heck no...it's called Miss Clairol and major dentistry work. Maybe a little botox, a nip & tuck here 'n there. When I go to my class reunion (35th - ouch) in June, I'll probably be one of the few in my class that isn't a grandparent yet.

One can only assume that at this point, Baby Brother had lost interest. Or had to go out and arrest someone that one of us had gone to school with at some point. Small town. You know how it is.........

P.S. Darling Sis, you missed one. Georgie Porgie was when I made the mistake of leaning in too close to the Chief of Police. He would grab my cheeks in his chubby little hands and shout Georgie Porgie while squeezing really, really hard.

I suppose that was his way of getting back at me for all those times when he was just learning to walk and I would put him in his baby walker into the middle of the family room where I would run around him in circles singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and staying just out of his reach........man, I wish I had video of that.