Real Grown Ups..My Little Sister

I took this picture of my sister and my niece getting ready to catch the bus for the first day of school back in late August (they start earlier there than MI). It was the start of the school year for my sister too, as she works as a elementary school counselor in the area. (You may not be able to see it, but the backpack is pink camo print--fitting for a princess-pretending, soccer powerhouse, plays-in-the-dirt-but-likes-Hannah Montana-kindergartener!)

My only sibling, my sister is 3 years younger than me. And--big dramatic pause here--she turns the big 4-0 in a couple of weeks. "One day it happens--you think to yourself, 'you know, that music is kind of loud,' and you reach over... and turn it down...and you are 40." At least that's what the card I'm sending her says. And no, I'm not worried about her reading it here first, because she doesn't read my blog. She only recently got a computer in the house connected to the Internet. She would admit to a little fear of it, but mostly it's just that she just thinks the kids (and she and hubby for that matter) have better things to do than surf the net--like "get outside and blow the stink off you", for goodness sake! (something my mom used to say regularly). And get outside she does. When I recently made the mistake of commenting that I had to get up at the ungodly time of 5:45 am to be able to carpool to work with my hubby, she said in her understated way "yeah, I was up at 5, out the door to run at 5:15 this morning." She admitted that due to the dark and cold and wind she did say to herself 'this is crazy'. But then she ran anyway--probably her normal 5-7 miles. She runs year round, switching to a treadmill only when it gets way too cold to be outside. She has run at least 3 marathons and I don't know how many half marathons over the last few years. She complained to my mom after a recent half-marathon that she seems to be getting slower. Then proceeded to share that she came in second in her age group and in the top 100 over all. She's fast--she qualified for Boston, but just couldn't get the logistics to work to go. And at only 5 feet tall, we figure she has to take a lot more steps per race than some of the runners! She's gutsy and tough though. In high school she ran hurdles--hurdles! And she managed to finish--with a decent time--the grueling 2007 Chicago marathon before it was called off due to heat. The year before that, she ran in the very brisk (ok, being southern Indiana girl she called it "brutal") Detroit Free Press Marathon.


She's a great mother. One of the things her little country church does twice a month is take their youth kids to a local food pantry to help sort items. She takes my nephew, who couldn't believe there were people around that couldn't just go buy groceries. My niece, who is actually too young to be in the group, went each week to help pack boxes and carry as well. She's teaching them already the satisfaction and thankfulness that comes from helping those who don't have the blessings you have.

Her job as a school counselor is a tough one. When kids act up in school or just seem to be having a rough day, they go see her. She gives them playdough to distract them and occupy their hands so they can talk about their feelings. Some come from slightly broken homes where Dad and Mom spent the night before yelling at each other. Some come from really broken homes where Dad spent the evening hitting mom or abusing them. How much must it break your heart to talk with a child who is experiencing the devastation of incest? You would think it wouldn't be too bad in a small town in heartland America, but the problems are there and she is their advocate, helping them cope or getting them the help they need even at their very young ages.

Real grown ups--like my sister--do the hard thing, even when it requires sacrifices and personal discomfort. They role out of bed and hit the pavement out of discipline and love for what they do, knowing it makes a difference in their life. She gets medals all the time for running races--for being self-disciplined enough to train and compete. But it's what she does to make a difference in others lives, and how she teaches her kids that it's not really all about us and our little world of comfort and material stuff, that is truly medal worthy. And it makes me want to be like her when I grow up.