Every year since 2005, I have acknowledged my sister's birthday on Facebook. Yesterday I did not. It is not because I forgot.
Although
I did spend some portion of the day wondering if her friends and my
family would think that I forgot. I did not forget.
But
yesterday, I did not want to deal with anybody else. I did not want to
hear their memories of my sister or hear their empathies or
sympathies. Yesterday I was dark. And when I post things on Facebook, I
prefer not to be dark. When I post about my sister, Tracey's, birthday on Facebook, I try to have it be a celebration of the 39 years
she lived as opposed to the morning of the 18 years I’ve had without
her.
I always give
myself a pass on March 12. I usually don’t know how I’m going to feel
that day. Sometimes I celebrate life in a big way – go out to dinner,
buy something special for the kids, call old friends. Some days I feel
very dark. My sisters birthday is a harder day for me than the day she
died. I don’t know why but it is. Perhaps it’s because on the day she
died I think about her release from this life and her joy in heaven with
her husband and the animals she loved so much. I think of the beautiful
spot where her ashes were laid to rest and I think of her being at
peace and out of pain.
On
her birthday however, I think about her life. I think about what is
unfinished what was left unfinished and the many, many, many years of my
life that have been without her.
Yesterday
I thought about posting something on Facebook. But I’m really tired of
the same pictures of me and her. Every picture ending with me at age 18.
Not
only that, but we took very very very few pictures together. She and I were alive together in the days before cell phone cameras and we never spent time
taking pictures together. I did not want a reminder of that on Facebook
today. There are almost no pictures of just my sister and me together -- just the same dozen or so of us in a group. And they
will never be any additional pictures. And I didn’t need that reminder
on Facebook today.
My
senior year of high school was the first year we started to share
secrets. It was the first time I felt like she and I might be on the
same page. It was also the last nine months before she died. I had a lot
going on that year. I had a boyfriend, I applied to colleges, I had
Senior harp recitals, standardized testing, extracurricular
activities, friends, everything a senior year should be for an all
American girl. I didn’t have a lot of time to spend with her but the
time I did spend with her was good that year.
I have brief
snapshots of memories of her coming to my tennis matches, of her
bringing me workout pants at school when I forgot them, of our having a
movie night up at her house, of my spending the night at her house for a sleepover. A memory when I’m
sitting next to her in church on Christmas Eve and I’m come back to sit
next to her after I played the harp. Listening to her voice sing the
Christmas carols.
I do
think we would have grown closer. Because of the hope we had during my
senior year. And all those are not things I want to put on Facebook. I
didn’t want to deal with anybody else yesterday.
I can remember my sister
and her birthday without telling Facebook about it.
