A Sisters Bond -The Beginning

A SISTER’S BOND
The Beginning

On April 6, 1981 my best friend was born. By the age of one she started having health problems. She began passing out a lot. She is my little sister, Ann. My first memory was when I was in kindergarten once a month a case worker would take our whole family to Ann Arbor to have Ann checked. They found a brain tumor and they told us the day they planned to do surgery it had disappeared as they checked one more time before shaving her hair. Our parent s are both mentally handicapped. Dad was in a car accident when he was ten. His mother was killed and he was in a comma for six months some other siblings were also hurt. Mom was a sick child and had a childhood fever that caused brain damage.

As we grew Ann was very quiet and shy, but by the age of ten she blossomed into an outgoing fun girl. She didn’t get in trouble in school until 5th grade when she got in a marker fight. I on the other had been spanked almost every year of elementary school.

Right before I started kindergarten a family from First Baptist Church visited our family. Our case worker worked out a payment plan to put us in Bridgeport Baptist Academy Christian School. She told the pastor “I think this is the only thing that will save these girls.” When the money stopped coming in we could have easily been turned away into the public school system. But the Principal and Pastor saw something in our lives and made an eternal investment in us. We began work scholarship and continued it through graduation. We went to every camp, every church activity, played volleyball, and cheerleading. Ann began playing the violin in 4th grade. I have many memories of it because I also had to go to her lessons with my mom so I could help practice at home. I played clarinet a couple of years. We both graduated from Bridgeport Baptist Academy. Upon our graduation we both went off to Bible College in Powell, TN. While at Crown College I was Ann’s dorm supervisor, after I graduated she moved into my apartment to save on expenses.

We were both in the big brother/big sister program. I had many “big sisters”. When Ann was being matched to her first “big sister”, Cheryl. Ann prayed that Cheryl would be her big sister, and they were together the whole time they were in the program. When Ann & Cheryl left the program the bond they built did not leave. They still got together as Ann got older and went off to college. Ann spent every Christmas Eve with Cheryl and her family. Cheryl was more than a friend she was family to Ann. I am so thankful to Cheryl and all the adventures they had together.

We had many adventures growing up: playing in the attic (story: not good to go up in the attic if your big sister is not there to tell you were to step and not to step. I told Ann lots of times you can’t step in the area right when you get up there stay on the beams or you will fall through. One day I get home after a volleyball game walk to my room duck under the ceiling hanging and go back to the living room ask dad where is mom and Ann. He calmly says look up. I look up and see a huge whole with my lamp hanging through the ceiling. They were at the emergency room with Ann foot she ended up sprained it really bad. She had week ankles the rest of her life.); surfing down the basement stairs on all kinds of things (story: don’t go down the stairs on a saucer sled you fall off the side and get hurt doesn’t go straight down, but cushions and mattress work great.); water fights that almost caught the house on fire (story: I am doing dishes Ann had a friend over we get in a huge water fight in the kitchen. Afterwards Ann’s friend decides to get in the shower to clean up. We were all a mess. The next thing you know we are calling the fire department the place is covered in smoke. We are banging on the bathroom door for her friend to get out. We are not sure if the water got in the vent and the house is going to blow up. Her friend thinks we are lying, opens the door runs out in a towel shampoo in her hair we ask the neighbor if she could get shampoo out of her hair and get dressed. Fire department arrives and finds out it wasn’t even us the dryer plug was sparking and that caused the smoke. Ann friend goes home with a memory we all had to spend the night at grandmas to air out the house.); sledding off the roof into the snow, jumping off the barn (story: we were at family’s house jumping off the top of the barn 4 cousins had gone landed, I go land, Ann goes lands on her bottom and passes out. She comes to and we all get in trouble from my Grandma.). I have many more adventures and crazy things we did.

Our lives have many fingerprints on them of people who invested in us. Who will you invest in today? You can make a difference in somebody!