”You always made things fun,” my little brother, as I still call him, said in his Mother’s Day message to me.
I responded by telling him he was the first person I ever mothered. Peter, the surprise baby who came along eight years after me, brought out my earliest maternal instincts.
“Do you remember our ‘Johnny on the Pony 1-2-3’ game?” I asked him.
Propping him on my raised knees, I would recite the Johnny phrase as I quickly collapsed my legs, holding his hands and he would squeal with his cute baby laugh and clap his little hands.
We both liked the game so much that I created another version of it. This one was called “elevator going up” when I bounced him on my knees as I slowly raised them and “elevator going down” when I collapsed them.
Now I wonder how and why I ever came up with that idea, since even then I was claustrophobic and didn’t take elevators. Was I wondering subconsciously if it could really be as fun as my baby brother’s laughing response made it seem? Or maybe, I just didn’t want him to have a bad association with elevators because of me? I was a bit young for that kind of forward thinking, but I’m hoping it could be possible.
I’m happy to report that he not only grew up to be an elevator-riding adult, but one who amicably accompanied his sister on her lifetime of walking stairs. Even today, when he visits, if we are in a restaurant together and I excuse myself to go to the restroom, he follows and stands guard outside the door because he knows I will not lock it.
As he got older, my games grew a bit more sophisticated.
Peter reminded me about the mock surgery I staged when he swallowed his chewing gum one night, when my friend Lois was keeping me company while I babysat. We laid him on the couch while I “performed” an operation where we removed the chewing gum. I am assuming we first checked to make sure he was not choking before I turned myself into Dr. Kildare with Lois as my nurse.
What surprised me the most was not only that he remembered the story, but that he said I always made things fun. I love that legacy. It’s so much nicer than remembering me as his bossy big sister, which he would be happy to tell you that I was. But at least that’s not his first memory of me.
I’m making a note to ask him to tell these stories at my funeral someday. I fancy the idea of being sent off with laughter.
Email patriciabunin@sbcglobal.net. Follow her on Patriciabunin.com
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