More John

Yesterday was personal analysis, today is rivalry.  As the oldest I had to stand on my rights.  Yes, oldest trumps all when it comes to the pecking order, not to mention that parental responsibility passed down to me as The Babysitter.  I took it seriously but John, feeling that he was the oldest boy must have had some misogynist tendencies.  In any event of all the siblings he was the one I had the most trouble with in “making him toe the line”.  I think the most horrific episode was when I was around 12 and John defied me when I was calling him home since Mom and Dad were out on a drive and it was time to get the kids into bed.  John was playing far in the field behind the house and when I yelled for him to come in he refused.  Well, I was going to fix his banana. 

Almost all of that day John and his friend Greg had built a beautiful town for their dinky toys.  Greg’s dad worked at the telephone company (I think) and he brought home little bits of rejected wire which Greg brought out for John to make street lamps (pretend of course) for the roads.   It really was a beautiful and large city they had made.  Well, when John wouldn’t come in the devil got in me.  I yelled, “if you don’t come in right now I am going to rip this city apart”.  John looked at me but didn’t believe I meant it.  Wrong, I took hold of those wires and tore up his city.  John was like a speeding bullet and there was fire in his eye (even with my poor eyesight I knew what was coming).  I ran inside, locked the door but John was beside himself (the stoic was gone that time).  He smashed his fist through the glass and then panic set in for both of us.  He had slit his wrist and blood was pouring down onto the driveway.  I opened the door and thank the Lord, Mom and Dad drove up just then and within seconds Dad had John in the car and was speeding down Appleby Line to Dr. Scott’s house where he got stitched up right quick.

The other rivalry is our “memory”.  John swears he remembers things from when he was one year old and the other day I turned to Mom and said “Ole now thinks he remembers in the womb” at which point he said “no, that is Erik”.  As mentioned earlier it’s hard sometimes to discern memory from anecdotal stories but my eyebrow goes up at some of the things he seriously says he remembers.  So we have contests (friendly) on what we remember.  It is a good way to get out some of the stories I am trying to set down both on the blog and my “Permission to be Sanne” biography (well, I hope one day it will be finished).

I was used to say that I am the competitive person on the planet but as my readers are bound to notice I think maybe I am totally wrong on that score!  When it comes to sports I must say I don’t give a rap but when it comes to brain power, well, I guess I am a little competitive.  J  Dad would challenge md but John is a good second I that regard; in fact he is probably not even second since Dad’s challenges were for personal growth but with John – it really is competition.

And that’s enough about Bro #1.