A sister is a gift to the heart

DAY 3- December 26

"A sister is a gift to the heart, a friend to the spirit, a golden thread to the meaning of life." - Isadora James

My journey today began with a 2am alarm. Waking, I got dressed and drove the two hours to Auckland Airport to collect my sister, back for a week from Perth.

The plane landed early and by 5.30am we were back on the road heading towards KatiKati.

The journey we travelled together this morning was literal. But the real journey I've travelled with my sister is a figurative one.

I was seven when she was born. There are three brothers between us. When I started teaching she was the age of the students I was teaching.

She was a challenging teenager, and I was a young adult. We moved between being close, with her spending holiday breaks with me, and between us both having no understanding and little tolerance of each other.

Over the years our own personal journeys have taken us far away from each other. It has been 15 years since we lived in the same country. She was in New York, then I was in Fiji. When I returned to NZ she emigrated permanently to Perth.

But figuratively, as the years between us have diminished, that gap that seemed insurmountable when she was 15 and I was 22, has closed. 

The journeys we have both travelled have bought us to a deep understanding and respect for each other on top of the natural love that familial connections demands.

We have good relationships with our three brothers, all very different, but good.

But the bonds of sisterhood are something else again. 

I feel lucky that part of my journey over the next month includes 4 days with just the two of us exploring Melbourne together.  

Sisters is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship.  ~Margaret Mead