For Mom and Veronica

My mother's sister is dying. I just got the news from mom, who's obviously, horribly upset. I can't even imagine what she's feeling right now. Understand, that I don't really know my aunt. To me, she's always been this quirky woman who lives far away in California. I saw her maybe once a decade when she and her family would come to visit us in good ol' Dodge City, KS. I remember that she liked to laugh, which is good because she was (I already think of her in the past tense, though, as I understand, she's not quite passed on yet) married to a real funny-assed, cool guy. When I was a kid, I used to like to just sit and listen to my parents talk to Veronica and her husband 'cause the stories of the old times were always nonsensical and funny. However, when mom called, my first thoughts weren't sadness for my aunt. As I said, I hardly knew her in anything other than a superficial way. I always kind of liked her, but I didn't really know her.

People always say that the worst thing you can experience is to outlive one's child (something both sets of my grandparents understand now), or to lose a parent, or a spouse or basically anyone in your family. I expect that it is, but as I try to deal with my feelings, I've come to understand that there's got to be something truly complicated, wonderful and twisted about one's relationship with a sibling. I'm trying to process what my feelings should be and I keep coming up with this near apathy and resulting guilt. However, I know my grandparents and my mother are despondent. Trying to understand what mom's feeling brings to mind the nature of our relationships with our brothers and sisters.

To me, no one knows us like our siblings do. The way I see it, by the time we're older, not necessarily mature, we've already developed the side of our personalities that we show to everyone else. Only our brothers and sisters have known us all our lives, even when we were spoiled, selfish, and petty, before we learned that you're not supposed to act like a little asshole all the time, especially not in public. Who else have you let see you do something truly evil? Who else have you hurt like you've hurt your brothers and sisters? I can't think of anyone I'd ever make lay on the ground so I could jump a bike over... other than my little brother. I can't imagine locking anyone out of my house in her underwear... other than my little sister. There's no one in the world who, if they flipped over their bike handlebars, could make me laugh like I did when my cousin/uncle/brother (it's complicated) did. Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? Our siblings do. My brother and sister know things about me that even my parents don't know, thank God. They've usually, graciously, kept the skeletons in our shared closet until the Sanchez status of limitations have run out.

Siblings are those who:

• Have seen us at our worse
• Know where the bodies are buried
• We sometimes can't stand to be around (maybe it's just me, but I doubt it)
• Drive us batshit crazy
• We don't talk to all that often
• Know all of our weaknesses
• We can relate to in a truly unique, timeless way

I can go months without talking to one of my siblings and when we finally do talk, it's like we were just yesterday, watching t.v. in the front room together; fighting, laughing, yelling and NOT doing our chores. Losing any one of these people would feel the loss of a limb, if not a vital piece of my soul. Thinking of that is how I can relate to what my mom's going through. That's why I feel like crying and that's how I can even come close to feeling her despair. Here's hoping God welcomes my aunt home and envelopes her in all the love and warmth in the universe. Maybe, if my aunt thinks of it, she can arrange that my mom can share in that warmth. If it's possible, I'm sure she will.