Unca D

Let me tell you about my sister S. She is a wonderful person (both my sisters are wonderful women but I will write about J another time). She is kind, honest and straightforward. She is personable without being gushing and nice without being ingratiating. She is an upstanding person, proud of herself but not arrogant. I am proud of her too. She has made a fine career as a teacher, a vocation she has had since she was 13 or 14. She has worked for years in a deprived area of London, in a school at the bottom of its league table, and has dragged the girls at her school a grade higher than they were really capable of. She inspires success in her classes.

We have always been friends. We've had our moments (I am a moment-having kind of person) but we have a deep well of love to see us through rough patches. An abiding, enduring love, which will be a source of comfort to me throughout my life, not a shallow love that needs to be paid for over and over, and is lost when you do not have coin to pay.

I have met few better people than my sisters. I say that honestly, not just because they are related to me. I say it because they are people you would want in your corner. S is not always selfless or reliable, but she is loyal and decent. She would not sell you out, lie to you, steal from you or hurt you if she knew how to avoid it.

She will be a fantastic mother. That is why I am writing about her. My beautiful sister is going to have a child. My heart is overflowing and I don't know what else to say about it. I can think about there being a little reflection of me (the first niece or nephew who shares my blood), about how much I want to be able to share the child with S (and how it hurts that I will have to live here and only know him or her through photos and telephone calls), about the million dramas, tragedies and stories that a new life contains, but another time. Right now I am just all tears of joy.

posted by Dr Zen @ 8:50 pm