~from Ami

One of my favorite things to do is queue some music on my laptop (right now I'm hooked on David Gray's "White Ladder" CD) and start a slideshow of my pictures. I scrolled through The Archives tonight, and stumbled across this picture of me and "The Sistahs" from Easter 1982.

L-R: Ami, Erin, Megan, Carrie: Easter 1982.

Check out our Easter dresses. My mom sewed every single piece! I remember picking out the patterns, hunting for the perfect shoes at the Payless in Fayetteville, next to the Chinese Buffet. The little girls' dresses matched. I guess by this time Carrie and I (the next oldest to me) weren't required to dress like twins. I'm the oldest, then Carrie, Erin, and Megan. See how Carrie and I have our hands on the little girls. They were our dolls- we dressed them up and fought over them, at times they were mere pawns in The Great Sibling War, which was fought in bloody, hair-pulling increments from California to Arkansas.

Easter 1982, our parents had just announced their divorce nonchalantly in the living room, just in time for my birthday. Oh, the joy of Easter 1982! See how everybodys' white tights sag, all hand-me-downs from another sister.

The baby, Megan, her head down, grinning at the newly-greened grass. Erin, glaring at the camera- how DARE someone make her take a picture! Carrie and I, the Big Sisters, our arms over the little kids' shoulders. Carrie leans in, trying to protect the babies from the wind. I look almost ready to tear myself away, fake leather pumps inching ever closer to the road. The spiderweb strings of SWEPCO power lines in the background, the trees' spring leaves curling slowly open, recovered from the worst Arkansas ice storm on record (the tree at the left still bowed in remembrance of the weight of that ice).

My sisters live seventeen hours away from me, this Easter. Their tights don't sag anymore :-) but I still wish I were near them, able to put my arms snug around their necks, tell them it will all be okay, because I may look like I'm longing to fly, but I'll always be watching over them.