The Stamp of Sisterhood

by Jasmine Wang

Dear Jenny Menny (天天),

Before me, there was you. My Big Sister. My 姐姐 (jiejie).

Do you ever think about how there’s never been a me without you? I have been and always will be your 妹妹 (meimei).

妈妈 (mama) tenderly reminisces how after my birth, you, at your big age of five, carefully walked her through quiet hospital hallways, pushing along her IV drip. A soft smile tiptoes across her face as she remembers how you nagged her to take each step slowly as the two of you padded around the hospital. I imagine the blinding fluorescent lights were dimmed to a low, warm yellow that makes the two of you glow with love, especially you. You, who have always been kind. You, who grew up too fast. You, who were always the big sister.

Do you think you were born to be a big sister? Is this—us—kismet or just chance?

If the multiverse exists, I hope that we are sisters in every world. I hope our psyches are woven into each other, if not by blood, then by love. I hope that a small part of me and a small part of you is always looking for the other. And if we are not, by some cruel stroke of fate or jealousy, how lucky am I that I get to exist in this universe as your sister. Because who would I be, if not your sister?

Who would I be if I didn’t grow up on your perfect grilled cheeses—those plastic-y slices of American cheese that you nestled between two slabs of Wonderbread—that I swear you toasted on the stovetop, but you argue you simply warmed up in the microwave?

Who would I be without your infectious love of Taylor Swift? The one that burns as brightly today singing All Too Well (10 minute version) as it did when I was five and you were ten, screaming Love Story in the backseat, before we even knew what the word love meant. 

Who would I be if we didn’t spend 巴巴’s (baba) company Christmas parties glued together, snickering and fabricating stories about strangers, or if we didn’t memorize all of Eminem’s rap from Love the Way You Lie? 

Who would I be if we didn’t grow up choreographing fake combat sequences to perform for 妈妈 and 巴巴 or racing out of grocery stores to claim the front seat?

Sometimes I miss a time when it was as simple as fighting over that front seat and bickering over whether or not I stole your favorite coral tank top with the rhinestones—I definitely borrowed it, sorry. 

But maybe it was never simple. Maybe living was never meant to be simple.

When did we stop fighting for that front seat? When did we grow up? When did you grow up?

Sometimes it feels like you’ve always been grown up, always known more, known better. 

Do you remember the first night we moved into our childhood home? The one slipped between the elderly Chinese woman with fault lines of wisdom that cradled her eyes, and the borderline rabid bichon frise that would chase me down the street. Do you remember how we huddled together in our sleeping bags on the floor of our barren living room? 

Our first night. The exposition that flipped open a new chapter.

But I was barely four years old, uncomfortable and afraid on those foreign floors. So I turned on my side, tugging at your sleeve.

I want to go home, I quietly pleaded. And you patiently turned to face me, petting my small head reassuringly.

We are home, you breathed. 

I was only four and you were nine, so I trusted you because you knew better.

妈妈 often tells me another story about you—about you before me. It was a few months after the three of you had first immigrated to Canada, after the technicolor magic of the immigrant’s dream for a better life had dulled. 妈妈 and 巴巴 had finally realized that starting a new life would not be so easy, as she struggled to teach herself English and as he wrestled to find a job.

You were so small then, you barely hit her waist. Every day after school, the two of you strolled through the neighborhood peppered with rundown condos and other immigrant families also scrapping for survival.

But amidst the dull concrete, speckled with regret and despair, you spotted a bright cobalt blue lollipop glued to the sidewalk. I imagine it’s blue because blue has always been your favorite color. And you immediately perked up as you ran to rescue it. 妈妈 laughs with sad eyes as she tells this story. As we sit across from each other at the dinner table, we quietly think of your joyful resilience—a strength no child should need, but that you inherited nonetheless. 

I wish the world had been kinder to you. And I wonder if eldest sisters everywhere will always be destined to grow out of their girlhood far too fast. 

Do you ever resent the hardship that I never endured?

I am sorry for that. 

I am sorry you spent your girlhood steering our new life in America instead of gossipping about crushes and obsessing over which Aéropostale top to wear to school. I am sorry you were robbed of the chance to be childish.

But selfishly, I am still grateful that you raised me as much as 妈妈 and 巴巴 did. So, thank you for raising me, for watching me grow up. More importantly, thank you for growing up alongside me, for having the same tastes on new restaurant menus, the same nose for a person’s character, a better ear for danger, and for letting me have the best view of watching you grow up too. I hope I have made you proud the same way you’ve made me proud of you. 

Our childhood seems long gone now, and yet, some days, I still feel like I’m barely four and you’re nine and three quarters with all the knowledge I have yet to learn. On those days I am swept back to those unfriendly colonial maple floors and our shared sleeping bag, as we drift off to sleep with my tiny toes tickling your knobby kneecaps. 

I am reminded that what I didn’t know at four, but what you knew at nine was that we would make this house into a home. We would plant mulberry trees along our driveway and fill our garden with poppies and magnolias. We would paint our garage doors a questionable pale teal and get in trouble for scribbling on the walls and sliding down banisters. We would race down the street on our bikes, with me always happily trailing after you like your shadow. We would fill our home with lyrical laughter and hours of painful piano practices.

But what neither neither of us knew at four or nine is we have always been, and always will be, each other’s home—whether in Canada or America, whether 1,000 miles away at college or just down the hall, whether walking home the “shady way” from school or tucked away in 妈妈’s closet pretending we’re camping under a midnight sky sprinkled with stars. You have always been my home, the place where I will always return to.

I hope you remember that you can always come home too. 

On the days when you feel like you’re only four and all you really want to do is to go home. Please, remember I am here. 

I say all this with a whisper, a squeeze of the hand, and a soft resting of my head on your shoulder. 

Come home, and let’s be childish together. That’s what sisters were made for. 

With all my love,

Your 妹妹, 

Jazzy Wazzy (丫丫) <3