Walking the Wall

This past weekend my sisters and I took a whirlwind trip to Mackinac Island, MI (you can click on the picture to the left for a slide show of pictures). It was the first time that we’ve ever gone on a trip together and there was a lot of corn dogging, a bit of whining (note to self, don’t allow Sarah to get hungry), and a whole lot of fun.

It is strange for me to relate to my sisters as women, there is such an age difference between us that they have always seemed more like nieces than sisters. I’m 37, and when I was 12 years old my sister Sarah (in the white) was born, and then when I was 17 when Joanna was born (green) and finally 19 (and soon married) when Emily was born (brown tank). Sarah is now 25, Joanna is 20 and Emily is 18 and just graduated this year. They aren’t little girls anymore, they are young women and they aren’t my daughters or my nieces…they are my sisters. I like the feel of it, having real sisters.  I know I’ve written about this already, but being away with them this weekend seemed like another step.

It was fun to walk around the island four strong, laughing and whining and picking and laughing some more. Going back on the ferry Sunday we sat at the very front and when the boat got going full swing the wind was just whipping–wonderfully blowing and buffeting and I held onto my hat and I laughed. We goofed off the whole way and I looked down the seat at these lovely women and just grinned. People in front of us kept looking back at us and smiling as we grabbed for things about to fly away, as we "whoa-ed" and laughed hysterically at big bumps.

I’m reminded of the movie I was surprised to enjoy awhile back, about sisters, called In Her Shoes and at the end of the movie she  reads a poem by e.e. cummings  to her sister and reduced me to tears, and when I think of sitting on the ferry and watching the wind whip through my sisters hair, their faces plastered with smiles, I think:

here is the deepest secret nobody knows(here is the root of the root and the bud of the budand the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which growshigher than soul can hope or mind can hide)and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)