Sister

I can no longer fit into my jeans from the amount of food that I've consumed today. It's acutally hard to breathe. Sit around watching TV with Mike's family, finally getting to edit pictures from a couple of events.

Loving this one of Yani and her yellow lab, Linda:

If you don't understand how a woman could both love her sister dearly and want to wring her neck at the same time, then you were probably an only child.  

~ Linda Sunshine ~

Happy Birthday, Papi!

Today is my dad's birthday.

(Picture Credit)

I've already spoken about how absolutely vital my mom and dad are to me and my sister. Last night we were able to celebrate one part of that equation with a birthday party for my dad at my parents house. There was great food, music, and, best of all, family and friends.

Funny story: our neighbor had a huge projector screen in his backyard for the fight. Suffice it to say that this neighbor, who loves my father, macheted his trees so that the men who were hanging out by the fence to watch this fight, including my father and my husband, could get a good view of the fight. He then handed over some pork in tupperware that he just roasted. Ah, neighbors.

Yani and I have an awesome dad. He's not always easy, but he is wondeful, loving, funny and supportive. Things wouldn't be the same without him.

Felicidades, Papi. Te quiero, Tita.

Vintage Love

This picture of my parents is on my bulletin board behind my computer, right in my line of sight. It's one of my favorite pictures ever. Yeah, they're blurry and a box of crackers sit in front of them but their smiles are genuine and these are smiles I've seen throughout my whole life. The fact that my sister has it in her house as well, speaks volumes about how it encompasses everything that is wonderful about them as people, as a couple and as parents.

I can't be honest about myself or really become who I want to be without pausing for a moment to think about how much these two people have influenced me. I always say that the only reason that I've been able to do anything in my life, take any of the risks, is because they have so firmly stood in my corner every step of the way.

One of the things that I love so much about my family, and I don't just mean my parents, Yani and Abuela, but my aunts, uncles and cousins (especially my favoritist of all, he knows who he is) is this notion of togetherness; of joining forces. I wrote about it in my poem Where I'm From. It's the subject of my everyday. And it all begins and ends with those two people up there.

I don't give my parents enough credit for the sacrifices they have made for Yani and me. So I guess this is my way of saying thanks for being the wonderfully good-humored, steadfast, loving people, parents, friends you've always been and continue being.

I totally made my mom cry...I know it.

~

Yan.

It’s been brought to my attention that I mention my sister quite a bit on this here website. So I figured I’d introduce you to the one and only Yanelle. Here we are on the left when we were kiddies. I’m the one in the background looking scandalous with my tummy out. My partner in crime growing up and even now, when we’re together we’re either laughing, arguing, or geeking out over some random thing. She thinks I’m a moron half the time, but then I guess I can be.

The truth is, I don’t give my sister enough credit for being a vital part of what holds our family together. I might not always like it, particularly when her wrath is aimed at me, but my sister’s fierceness is one of the things that I most admire about her. This one time, she was going home on the bus after water polo practice. I stayed behind to practice with the club team. There was some drama going on with the team and I guess someone was talking crap about me in the back of the bus without realizing that Yani was there. That poor girl didn’t stand a chance. That’s the thing about us, we might not always see eye-to-eye and we definitely have different ways of expressing ourselves, but if anyone messes with either one of us, we pounce on them like damn pumas.

It’s easier to list the reasons why my sister is one of my favorite people in the world, so I will:

· She hates it when I call her by her full name.

· When closing emails, she’ll exchange the first letter of a celebrity’s name with the letter Y such as Yanakin Skywalker or Yob Saget.

·She’s more sensitive than me but rarely shows it.

· She giggles uncontrollably when we go to the movies and I do the trick where I quickly grab one kernel of popcorn with my tongue like an anteater.

· She remembers all the things that I don’t.

· She’s a hustler.

· Sometimes when she sees me and it’s been a month since I waxed my eyebrows, she’ll circle her hand in front of my face while asking “what is going on with this situation?”

· She’s the one that keeps me grounded.

· According to the Wii, she’s horribly unbalanced.

· Anytime there was an occasion for presents, she’d ask for Lee Press On nails. Every. Time.

· When I finally got my own room, she helped me drag my mattress into her room when neither one of us could sleep alone.

· She constantly asks me for book recommendations.

· She’s the fastest reader I know.

· She’s the person to call if you need things done.

· She’s the one person who doesn’t need to tell me she loves me, her actions say it all.

This is us at my wedding. You can see in the background that the world was all but ending. She was one of the main reasons why our wedding was the best day of my life and why we managed to pull it off despite a tropical storm.

Photo taken by Chris Bickford