Of Sisters and Love

#wewillsurvive

#sisters

My sisters are the threads that define me.
Like the saree, they are the wefts and warps that together make me whole.
We lost our father young. I was 15, Thaya 12, Shuba 6.
He had cancer, we were 14, 11, 5 respectively when we found out.
Towards the end, when he was hospitalised for a not brief stint, poor mum used to complete chores, cook and leave early for the hospital, returning only in the late evenings, sometimes going back to be with him.
It’s weird how we tend to feel sorry for ourselves years later, but never at that time.
Probably because of our wonderful support mechanism of childhood friends and siblings. And uncles, aunts, neighbours.
My Thaya was my bestie then and always will be, My Shuba my baby, yet the one I’m in awe of, and love to bits.
Thaya and I used to sort our snacks, help Shuba with homework, and basically mother each other.
Thaya and I studied overseas together, completing the same degrees, my best friend became her husband, my husband was a good friend of hers (and mine), we got married on the same day on the same dais.
Losing dad only made the bond grow stronger, mum included.
Of course, then we never realised what it would have meant for 35 year old mum to lose dad at 40. Now, married with families of our own, struggling and overcoming individual trials and tribulations, we marvel at those days, we weep feeling sorry for ourselves, we pat ourselves on our backs, for what we had gone through.
That sealant causes us to continually spew one liners, jokes, advice, welcome or unwelcome, in WhatsApp groups, one aptly named Sisters;
We call, forgetting time differences across continents, to seek approval after chiding our children, advice on decisions, to laugh, weep, gossip.
And when we’re done calling, we linger over Social Media posts, revelling in the beauty and grace of a niece’s dance, or the excitement of a nephew’s futsal match, we tap the Love button and post a comment, the next best thing to being there, and smothering each other with hugs and kisses.
We know each other so well, that whatsapp messages sing with joy or cry with despair, a monosyllable signals an unhappy or preoccupied sister, a paragraph indicates a gossip or advice session is due.
We know exactly what to say to make things better, and in that same vein, how to be scathingly mean, we know each other’s vulnerabilities.
So, in the words of Toni Morrison, I believe she’s an American novelist and I haven’t read her books,
“A sister can be seen as someone who is both ourselves and very much not ourselves—a special kind of double.”