My Sister My Friend
I remember the morning of my sister’s wedding. She was getting ready in my mom’s room and I hid in the family guestroom writing my MOH speech. I picked up the pen to fill the empty page, as words filled the lines I started to cry. Words couldn’t capture my love for my sister. Memories filled my mind of moments worth more than gold.
My first sight of compassion was Talia blowing on a kids open scab that was covered with flies in Belle Glade, Florida on one of our first mission’s trip. I remember thinking, “What is Talia doing? She doesn’t know that boy!” She was maybe seven, but she knew nobody should have flies covering an open sore.
I remembered a time when I wore a new dress that my mom had ordered me from Lands End (I was a classy gal). I was maybe ten. We had a family over for dinner, they had a young boy my age that I wore the dress for. Talia says she remembers me showing off the whole night to this boy and she about had it with me. I remember the boy walking out the door and I stood waving flashing him a dimpled smile when suddenly I felt the bottom of my dress coming up over my polka dotted “Hanes Her Way” underwear, above my belly button exposing parts of myself that were not yet developed. I screamed in humiliation and spun around to see Talia looking down at me. She had a smirk on her face and looked proud of herself. I’m sure she got grounded or something. When we were finally able to laugh about it years later I asked her what in the world she was thinking at the time, she told me she remembered thinking amidst my flirtatious passes with the young boy, “Well, I’ll show her!”
I remember a particularly hard time in college when the person whom I thought was the “love of my life” broke up with me. I called her sometimes at three in the morning sobbing. She couldn’t understand me half the time, but she stayed on the phone and let me cry until I could fall back asleep for maybe a few more hours before the next melt down.
Seeing Talia enter into a covenant relationship with my now brother in law, Joe, was seeing a dream come into reality. I don’t know if I’ve ever experienced something so beautiful in my life.
Now Talia and I have had some heated arguments. There were times that I thought, “Blood is the only thing that will keep us together.” But we always reconcile. Talia always finds grace for my shortcomings. She always believes in the best for me and speaks life over my dreams and hopes.
Talia, being the oldest sister, keeps tradition going. When mom and dad are travelling she will round us kids up at her and Joe’s apartment and feed us scrumptious meals comparable to my mother’s incredible cooking. She will set up Settlers of Catan for us to play and make sure we are properly hugged as we walk out the door.
Seeing her become a mother this past year has been probably one of the coolest things I’ve ever experienced. She’s so good at it and I can’t get over how lucky Marston is to have such an incredible mom. She will be his friend, his advocate, his mother, his mentor, and his biggest fan. She will love that precious boy with the same fierce love that she has covered me with. She was made to love and she does it thoroughly well.
I’m so excited to have her meet me at the finish line in just another six weeks! I hear she has a five course meal waiting for me 🙂
Thank you Talia for praying me through life and this year. You are MORE than blood to me. 
