Happy Birthday Didi!

Here is another official introduction that I would like to make.
Meet Deepal. My older sister, my didi. She loves to travel. Has an unmatched knack for design and fasion. New York City is her favorite place on earth.

She might look “beautiful” and “sweet” in these picture, but let me assure you that this wasn’t also so. She tormented me mericlessly when I was a little girl. She made me say things and then blackmailed me for saying them. She made me do her chores and clean her room. As a game she made me play “waiter waiter” where I would wait on her while she ate. Unsurprisingly the game always ended when she finished eating and I never got my turn to be a customer. I should have caught on after the first time, but that is not the case (not the sharpest tool in the shed). She pretended to be possessed when mom and dad had a date night. She would turn off the lights and pretty much scare the sh*t out of me and take pleasure in making me cry the entire time my parents were gone.

It’s true. She did atrocious things to me when I was a kid. But over all she made growing up very easy, fun, and memorable.  She gave me rides on her bicycle when I didnt yet know how to ride one. She let me skip school when our parents were out of town and took me to the movies. She let me tag along with her and her friends.  She let me borrow her clothes, her ideas, her CDs so that I might educate my not so lucky friends. And most importantly, she made all the “mistakes” that parents hate so that by the time I entered teenhood, my mom and dad had exhausted all their energy on the first born and allowed me to do pretty much what I wanted, whenever I wanted. She was my ice-breaker and my path finder.

Over the years the five year age gap between the two of us seems to have narrowed as we have more serious things in common like, a career, a marriage, a household. The tormenting has also waned over time, except the ocassionaly “why do you STILL wear flare jeans“.

Then and Now.

Today is my didi’s birthday. She thinks she is getting old, but that is hardly the truth. Didi, you are still just as fearless, lively, beautiful, loving, smart, outspoken, and flamboyant as I remember from 20 years ago, except now with 2 kids, a husband, and a mortgage in tow. I dont know how you do it. If anything, I think you really need to act your age sometimes. Go get some mom jeans or something! And stop being so cool.

Happy Birthday. I love you and miss you. In the words of Jonathan Swift, may you live all the days of your life. cheers!