My Sister Pataricia

            My sister Pataricia Ann White was 10 and a half when dad brought home a big eyed wiggly baby girl to feed and clean and dress.  My mama was quite ill after I was born.  My mom and dad called her Patty Ann –said like one word when I was young- and we were the best of buddies the rest of her life.  She played with me, teased me mercilessly and toted me about until she left home when I was 7.

She and I shared a bed from the time I was a toddler.  I believe she was the one who taught me to love making up stories.  We often built stories in the dark at night.  I’m sure it was an effort to keep me quiet and make me go to sleep –a useless effort to be sure for I would be continuing the story long after she was quiet and breathing heavily.

She taught me to love drawing.  I remember when I was very young watching her draw.  She would stop what she was working on and draw me a picture.  It would have been a lovely picture had the twinkle not come into her eye.  But it always came and she would yield to the call of hilarity and draw something outrageous into the picture:  huge feet and knobby hands on a lovely princess or paper doll, an ogre in the bushes of a lovely scene, you get the idea.  I would yell and kick and mom or dad would scold “Stop tormenting that child!”  She’d laugh and eventually, I learned to expect the unexpected.  It became great fun.  She had an awesomely creative mind.

She was the light hand among my pseudo caregiver siblings and I sought her out.  When my parents were needing a break, she would carry me on her shoulders during family hikes.  We were sister friends despite the difference in our ages.

I was pretty young when she taught me to roller skate.  My sisters loved roller skating and at one point they were on a skate team of sorts.  My mom made them really cool skirts for rollerskating.  Eventually, I got one too, -just because.  I became their mascot I think.  Mostly I loved putting it on because I felt big like my sis.

I remember laying on the bed with them listening to Elvis Presley.  I didn’t see the big deal, but they did and I was just glad to be there with them.  And then my sister left to become Pataricia Ann Essex.  I don’t remember a lot about the time she was away.  I do remember that she returned with the most fun bundle of little girl I had ever seen.

My sister and I remained close.  I baby sat her kids.  She was in our home often.  I was in hers even when I wasn’t babysitting.

I moved away at 17 after getting married.  My sister was bad at writing, but oh when I did get letters they were so full of news and stories and love. Eventually my ‘age of the telephone’ ensued and we began talking once more. As with the letters, the intervals may have stretched some, but when we were talking, time just didn’t matter –well until we got the phone bill.  The calls had to be on weekends or late at night, but the bond never changed.  Every now and again we’d get to visit face to face.  We could communicate with very few words for we knew each other’s heart, but we seldom did that. She loved a good story about as much as my dad did.  Her mind crafted the words as she spoke, making the most of the rhythm of the story.

I went to visit her in the spring of ‘82.  My life was falling apart.  She assumed both the role of mentor and the role of friend.  It is a week I cherish in my memory.  She listened without judgment.  She advised out of a heart of love and deep conviction.  She strengthened my heart and my resolve and she nearly ran my body ragged!

My marriage ended about a year later.  She came down and we sat together and talked.  She was then less the advisor and more the deep friend:  words of caution, words of affirmation, words of sympathy.

I recall the last family reunion we spent together just short of a decade later.  We literally spent it ‘together’. If I hiked, she hiked, though later I would find out it was with great difficulty that she did so.  If I was cooking she was by my side.  I didn’t know it was our last.  She did.  I saw her for a short visit a month before she died.

This week marks the 23rd anniversary of her last week on earth.  I love her as much as the child making up stories in the dark.  I still laugh at the child learning to accept her hilarious, if sometimes frustrating sense of humor.  I love the gentle soul with her love of all things creative, her intense love for her children and her unwavering devotion to God even amid questions without answers. I am closer to where she is day by day, but in my waiting, I miss her sweet voice, her adventuresome spirit and her quirky sense of humor. And I honor the life that  ended sooner than my heart would wish.