The gift of siblings

Family picture day, 1965. My mother wanted to have a "nice" portrait of her adorable children. We did not cooperate.

I recently read an editorial about the value of siblings and the special role they play in our lives. The author, Frank Bruni, notes how siblings are with us through the whole arc of our lives.  They know us the longest of anyone, especially as we age and experience the deaths of our parents. Siblings are there for the childhood games of midnight tag in the summer, stagecoach on the bunkbeds, and ice skating on frozen ponds. They are there for the awkward teenage years when we are too fat or too thin, our hair too frizzy or too straight, our friends too close or too distant.  Siblings are there for our marriages and divorces, our children's births and toddler years, our teenagers' misadventures.  They are there to comfort us at the loss of our grandparents and parents. 

Siblings are part of inside jokes about things like persimmon pudding and incompetent camping that nobody else will ever quite understand. They are the people who can make us laugh until we cry, who with just a word or gesture can have us convulsing on the floor.

The role of siblings has been a long neglected area of social research, I think.  There is much to be learned about the role siblings play as role models, as caregivers, as counselors. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/26/opinion/sunday/bruni-the-gift-of-siblings.html?smid=pl-share