By Mitch Lee
I suppose I was pretty typical of the average pre-teen growing up in the Adirondacks. I struggled with the same hurdles every teen has about puberty, acne, first loves, and family angst.
And the dynamic of trying to fit in with another sibling who was going through the same changes.
Being Irish twins, my sister Erin and I were the same age for one whole month.
And she seemed none to happy to be sharing the age of 13 with me in late January and early February.
I would share my personal form of brotherly love by spying on her when she hid in the laundry room while on the phone with her friends.
I tugged on the long phone cord as it stretched from the kitchen just to get a reaction and a squeal from her.
I suppose it was a combination of teen angst and a bit of brotherly torture that made her breakdown and cry one night at the dinner table, when she wanted to go to a dance at the high school.
She had waited her whole life for her first real dance, and she was struck dumb when, in the middle of a pork chop, I suggested that since we were the same age, I should be able to go too.
The sound of her ranting rage filled the dinner air. The thought that my parents might let me go almost made her lose her mind.
I felt myself smirking a bit as I wrapped my lips around the lower half of my milk glass.
I could feel some of the milk escape as I tried to drink it without bursting out in laughter.
My parents were not happy that the dinner table had become drama central…and they were not as sympathetic as they could have been with my sister either.
Adding to the distress, my mother shook her head at me. I knew if I uttered just the right word I would get myself grounded…and my sister to leave the table in a full out crying jag.
But after looking up at my sister I decided to just let it go.
“I don’t want to go to the dumb dance anyhow. Besides, I might miss Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley,” I said, as if I was speaking directly to the pork chop I was putting in my mouth.
I think it was the grin I threw in that really took my sister over the edge.
“Please tell me he can’t go next year either since he thinks dances are dumb?” she pleaded to our parents.
The reality is, my sister and I didn’t have too many battles. We shared the same tight group of friends and we stayed pretty close all the way through high school.
She was a cheerleader for me at my basketball games, and I supported her through her dating years—even when she went out with my best friends.
Now the thought of aging and being Irish twins is not so bad as we are growing old together. I still can tease her a bit, but now it is no big deal being the same age for a month.
We can share the big hurdle years together and enjoy all the Irish months we have shared with laughter instead of tears.
Mitch Lee, Adirondack native & storyteller,
lives at Inlet. ltmitch3rdny@aol.com