Happy Birthday, Sis.
She was supposed to be the last one of us, and she was about as close to perfect as you could ask for.
My sister Catherine Gwynedd was born 28 years ago today. Seems impossible that it's been that long, but it has. She is the fourth of what eventually became five sisters, the sixth of seven children. She has ebony-dark hair and creamy white skin, the only one of us that looks like that. She's thin and tall and pretty, sings like a canary and is perhaps the single most organized person I ever met.
So, as I said, she's perfect.
This drove her sister Allison - a grasshopper bracketed by ants - up a wall, understandably. If she hadn't been so cute, there might have been real trouble. As it was, and is, though, she's extremely hard to hate.
When she was about six, she met this kid from down the way named Scott, little Scotty Carlson I called him, and decided she was going to marry him. Scott never had a chance, for which thing, I think, he'll be eternally grateful.
All through my mission in Hungary, I kept hearing that she thought I was playing basketball (I was gone a lot for that). When I got back, we took a family picture and tucked in the sash of her dress was a little plastic sword from the dinner we had eaten right before that. I love that picture; it's my favorite family photo.
She sang at our Granny's funeral, a song so achingly beautiful and so appropriate to the woman she was commemorating that none of us that were there will ever forget it. Her voice continues soaring and beautiful, not an operatic voice, but one of the sweetest and purest lyrical soprano voices God ever made. Her Christmas CD that she gave me as a gift is on permanent rotation on my computer. Yep, even in the summer.
Now she's a mother and some of that organization has cracked 'round the edges, at it will, and she's had to learn as much about modern fighter aircraft as she knows about opera (Scott is an aerospace engineer), but she's still the one we all assume will be planning any big family event. Hoping she will, because, like everything else she does, it will be flawless.
I love you, Cath. Happy birthday.
My sister Catherine Gwynedd was born 28 years ago today. Seems impossible that it's been that long, but it has. She is the fourth of what eventually became five sisters, the sixth of seven children. She has ebony-dark hair and creamy white skin, the only one of us that looks like that. She's thin and tall and pretty, sings like a canary and is perhaps the single most organized person I ever met.
So, as I said, she's perfect.
This drove her sister Allison - a grasshopper bracketed by ants - up a wall, understandably. If she hadn't been so cute, there might have been real trouble. As it was, and is, though, she's extremely hard to hate.
When she was about six, she met this kid from down the way named Scott, little Scotty Carlson I called him, and decided she was going to marry him. Scott never had a chance, for which thing, I think, he'll be eternally grateful.
All through my mission in Hungary, I kept hearing that she thought I was playing basketball (I was gone a lot for that). When I got back, we took a family picture and tucked in the sash of her dress was a little plastic sword from the dinner we had eaten right before that. I love that picture; it's my favorite family photo.
She sang at our Granny's funeral, a song so achingly beautiful and so appropriate to the woman she was commemorating that none of us that were there will ever forget it. Her voice continues soaring and beautiful, not an operatic voice, but one of the sweetest and purest lyrical soprano voices God ever made. Her Christmas CD that she gave me as a gift is on permanent rotation on my computer. Yep, even in the summer.
Now she's a mother and some of that organization has cracked 'round the edges, at it will, and she's had to learn as much about modern fighter aircraft as she knows about opera (Scott is an aerospace engineer), but she's still the one we all assume will be planning any big family event. Hoping she will, because, like everything else she does, it will be flawless.
I love you, Cath. Happy birthday.
posted by Cj at 10:24 AM
3 Comments:
Wow! I know mine won't be quite as glowing but now you have started a precedent and you better not let me down! love ya-- Mel
One does not know how to respond to such glowing praise. You are a wonderful brother and I wish I had the words you do to proclaim it all over the internet. I love you too.
-Cath
Yea Catherine!!!!
PS Um, grasshopper bracketed by ants... I don't get it but I'm gonna take it as a compliment.
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