Previously: After learning that my sister has less than six months to live, I cry for the closeness we once had.  We shared common interests throughout childhood and teen years, but she made higher grades and attracted the opposite sex. Knowing her younger daughter had several advantages over me, Mom didn’t want us to attend the same college.  But Barbara liked Albany based on her visits. Her beauty and sharp wit made her popular with the “movers and shakers” of the school.  She chose to ignore me except when she wanted to borrow money.
 
Chapter 67 ends:
Towards the end of my senior year, the man I’d been dating proposed. Little did I realize my upcoming marriage enraged my sister.  She had hoped to be first to the altar since I had been first to graduate.  I didn’t realize she saw me as a rival, particularly for Mom and Dad’s affection.


Barbara didn’t waste time.  My wedding would be in July the following year, 1965. I wanted to pay off my government loan first.  Thanksgiving of 1964, my sister announced that she and her boyfriend had made plans. “We’re getting married over the Christmas holidays.”  Her face glowed with triumph. Mom, Dad, and I were shocked into silence, not sure how to greet the news.

“This is certainly a surprise.” Dad finally mustered a reply.  “This is the fellow you brought home one weekend last year, right? Solid-looking guy, quite tall, thick black hair, glasses.”

“A lantern jaw,” Mom added.

“That’s John.” Barb grinned. He’s six-foot-one.  Played football for a while. He’s planning to teach Phys Ed after he gets his Masters next year. I’ll get a teaching job to support us. ”  

“Wouldn’t it be better to wait until you graduate?” Mom suggested.  

“I want to get married now,” she snapped. “My sorority sisters are all behind me. I had hoped you would be too.”  She crossed her arms in a defensive signal.

Mom was afraid of losing her stubborn daughter if she opposed her. As it was, Barbara never wrote letters or called unless it involved money as in making Phi Delta.  My folks counted on me to fill them in on her achievements. Barbara had discarded them just as she had discarded me.

Even though wedding invitations went out to her college friends, she didn’t expect them to come. It was four days after Christmas for one thing.  Also, my parents did insist she be married in her hometown, a five to eight-hour drive for her friends. I played Maid of Honor, but all I wanted to do was cry. This man is not right for you, Barbara, my instincts screamed.

Seven years later, after the breakup, my sister confided in me:  “When I walked down the aisle, I kept thinking, ‘If it doesn’t work out, we can always divorce’.” 

Later, she told me details that indicated the marriage went bad from day one. Frank and I visited their shoddy all-we-can afford apartment once and noticed how they sniped at one another. Was it a game to see who could outwit the other?  I remembered in our teens how my retorts couldn’t compete with her sharp tongue. Still, we always loved and looked out for each other.  Even throughout her many moves in search of a college teaching position and my many moves to keep up with Frank’s promotions, we stayed in touch.

Her life was not easy. A single mother with a son whose leg and arm muscles continued to atrophy. She kept searching for a man.  "I've slept with so many," she told me one summer at the cottage, "that I'm embarrassed." Was she bragging? Did she want me to feel jealous?  I admit to thinking a little variety would be fun now and then. Then I thought of the heartbreak that could ensue if you made the mistake of falling in love.  And Barb did suffer at the end of several relationships.

Each time she hurt, she called mother, not me.  Mom turned into a nervous wreck.  Her boyfriend problems caused emotional damage to both of them.  Angry with the situation, I called Barb. “Listen, Sis, when you want to talk to someone about what’s giving you grief, call me, not Mom.  She worries so much about you. It's eating her alive.  I’m a great listener.  Pour out your heart to me.

Unfortunately, when Barb called with break-up problems, I tried to make her see both points of view. “You’re saying it’s my fault,” she screamed one time and hung up.  At least, she could do that to me and I didn’t go to pieces.  I tried to call her back and apologize for upsetting her, but she didn’t pick up.  If she didn’t like what someone said, she shut them out.  After a cooling off period, Barb would call me with some good news, but rarely did she apologize for bad behavior.

When Bobby moved in with Mom and Dad, Barb would fly down for Thanksgiving and Christmas. On a couple of occasions, our half-sister Anne and her husband made it out too.  Mom and Dad loved it when we all got along together.  It would have stayed that way had Mom not moved in with us a year after Dad passed away.  Anne wanted our mother to head for South Dakota and stay with her. On the other hand, Barb was thrilled that I chose to care for her and said. "Thank you so much for doing that. You can have my share of the inheritance." . Then two years later she asked Mom to give her ten thousand dollars as down payment on a condominium. “After all” she argued, “You gave Shari twenty thousand to add a Grandmother suite to her house.”

Mom told her daughter, “No, it’s a bad investment. You move every two years in search of a better position.”  Barbara hung up. Mom changed her mind the next day. She called back only to find out that my sister had changed her phone number and e-mail address. She asked her son not to talk to us either, but he refused.  Thus did my sister choose to shut us both out of her life. It bothered Mom, but not me. I had Nichole, Chris and Frank. Who needed a sister?

Three years later, Barbara flew down.  Mom was in the hospital.  Bobby called  her, "You need to see her."

When I saw her at the bedside, we exchanged no hugs, but rather some ugly words in the hospital corridor. To my surprise, she apologized in a letter mailed after she went back to Missouri, her current home.  A week later, I saw her again at Mom’s funeral.  Again, we exchanged no hugs. I strained to make conversation, but she lavished her attention on Anne and Auntie Dee. 

Five years went by. I doubt she would have tried to keep in touch except that we visited Bobby every two months and helped him with grocery shopping.  She thanked us for that.  When she came to visit him at Thanksgiving and Christmas, we were included. Sometimes she'd forget her professional mask and  we connected if only for a half hour. The sister I once knew is still in there, I'd think.

When Bobby called to tell me Barb had been diagnosed with stage four cancer and had only a few months to live, I cried, but only for ten minutes. How do you mourn someone you don’t know anymore?  Well-meaning friends would offer condolences, and I felt guilty because it wasn’t that big a loss to me.

At least, I didn’t think so until a month later when she flew to Tampa to say her final goodbyes. 

To be continued.