10 | SEPTEMBER 15 • 2022
essay
The Gift of Siblings
T
he history of siblings
goes back to biblical
times. However, things
didn’t work out so well for Cain
and Abel or Esau and Jacob,
did they? Not to
mention Joseph’s
brothers who
sold him down
the river. On
the other hand,
Moses and Aaron
usually supported
each other. And
Rebekah and Leah married the
same guy, for crying out loud!
Thankfully, most of us have
relationships with our siblings
that are at least somewhat less
tempestuous.
My mom grew up in a large
family with two brothers and
two sisters. She was raised in
a busy household in Detroit;
she told us how she sometimes
retreated to the front closet of
her home to read in peace and
quiet. We observed her inter-
actions with her brothers and
sisters as adults, which included
frequent conflicts with one sister.
Of her sibs, only my Uncle Gary
is left, thankfully still sharp and
still the coolest guy in the room.
My dad had a fondness for his
older sister, but he often seemed
befuddled by the marked differ-
ences in their personalities.
I am blessed with two younger
siblings. My sister Shana (nee
Sheila) is three years younger
and my brother Michael is eight
years younger. My sister was
soft-spoken as a child, rebellious
as a teen, but she is now an adult
with an easy ability to express
her ideas and beliefs, always in
a kind way. My brother, who we
teased a bit when he was small,
has grown into a well-spoken
empathic man who can more
than hold his own in a con-
versation with his siblings. We
share a strong love of music,
expressed in slightly different
ways. Although my siblings and
I have distinct personalities, we
share many common beliefs and
values.
My standard joke about sib-
lings is that they are fellow “wit-
nesses to the scene of the crime.
”
That didn’t seem quite as funny
once I became a parent and saw
firsthand what a tough job it was
from the other side. Another
wonderful phrase I frequently
find myself saying is that we are
all “the imperfect children of
imperfect parents.
” That homily
comes in handy when someone
is looking to cast the first stone
about a conflict in his or her
family.
EXAMINING OUR ROOTS
My sister, brother and I have a
common need to examine and
re-examine our roots. Whenever
the three of us get together in
person or on Zoom, (my sister
lives in Seattle and my brother in
Philly) we almost immediately
begin talking about the good old
days. For the most part, we share
a feeling of how lucky we were to
have been raised by good, kind
people who loved us through
thick and thin. But that rarely
stops us from analyzing every
aspect of our parents’ parenting
style and laughing at their idio-
syncrasies. We laugh at my dad’s
pet phrases, like “How are you
fixed for socks and underwear?”
and my mom’s tendency to give
unsolicited advice, even to peo-
ple she had just barely met.
My siblings have mentioned
to me once or twice about how I
tended to ignore them once I hit
my teen years. I have asked for
and received forgiveness from
them, and we’ve maintained
a wonderful bond once we all
became adults. We remember
learning about family conflicts
and caring, while watching TV
shows together, such as Leave
It to Beaver, My Three Sons and
Father Knows Best. Of course, all
the conflicts were resolved in 28
minutes.
We often recall early years
of playing board games like
Monopoly and the Game of
Life and word games such as
Password and Scrabble, which
have now morphed into ongoing
internet battles of Wordfeud
(where both my bro and sis usu-
ally kick my butt). We remember
childhood road trips to Niagara
Falls and Tawas, which featured
endless games of License Plate
geography and too many cho-
ruses of “
A Hundred Bottles of
Beer on the Wall.
” We have also
shared many trips as adults,
often filled with music, games
and more talking about our
family.
My sister is a therapist, and
my brother is a professor of
organizational behavior; so,
when you add a child psy-
chiatrist to the mix, you get a
spirited discussion about “What
were our parents thinking when
they…?” We mostly agree that
we lucked out big-time com-
pared to most families of people
we know. But that doesn’t stop
us from engaging in endless
discussions about the long-term
effects (mostly good and occa-
sionally challenging) of how we
were raised.
PURELY COMMENTARY
Jeff London
Jeff London’s
family
The Three Londons:
Shana, Jeff and
Michael