The Terminator

My older sister (by two years) Lynn and I have always had a typical sibling relationship: she tries to murder or maim me while I persistently cling to life. She’s a small person, barely five feet tall, but she makes up for her lack of height with extremely focused energy and explosive ire. Once, in the seventies, when we were in a van riding to a concert with friends, her hair burst into flame. I don’t know how that happened! Yeah right. The fire circled the edges of her curly locks like a halo, and my immediate reaction was to extinguish the inferno by beating her about the head with my bare hands. Unaware that I had just saved her from a brutal singeing, and seeing herself as a victim of an unprovoked attack, she retaliated. It took about three people to pull her hands off of my neck, all saying things like, “Not cool man, you were on fire, man.”

Anyway, I have survived, but sadly, I am still none the wiser. Because I was physically beaten into submission as a youngster, then suffered severely stunted self-esteem in my pre-teens when she and her friends gathered round me to chant “Go to hell Gail” there is no longer any need for physical coercion. I developed one finely tuned mechanism for survival however—sarcasm. It has served me well at times, even though my son often fondly asks me, “How come no one has killed you yet?” Oh they have tried, grasshopper. They have tried.

Still, old habits die hard (such as using too many clichés) Lynn still catches me with her cunning and even manages to argue with me when I agree with her. How does she do it?! Just the other day at a July 4th celebration, we began an innocuous conversation after she remarked on the height of one of the cousins. “Well, I guess our side of the family got the short genes,” I innocently remarked.

“What do you mean?” she asked as though interested.

I pointed out that my father’s brother (our uncle) and his son were both 6” 5”. Our female cousins on both sides are approximately 5’ 9” or 5’ 10”. We are all well below such measures.

“Hmm,” she said. “And how tall are you?”

“Only about 5’ 5”,” the unsuspecting prey replied.

Mom jumped in and stated that she liked her own height just as it is. Of course.

“How tall would you like to be?” Lynn asks ever so casually as she backs her victim into a corner.

“Oh, I’d like to be about 5’ 9”,” I answer.

Now she fixes me in her glare. If she could emit lasers, I’d be dead. I sense that something has gone “terribly wrong” as the newscasters like to say. Then it comes.

“Well I’d like to be 5’ 5” you bitch!”

How I love family gatherings.