An added blessing for us that Jennifer is attending Pepperdine in Malibu is that it puts her in the same part of the world as her older sister who graduated from Chapman in Orange County last spring.
However, just because two sisters live within 60 miles of each other, it certainly doesn’t mean that they will want to have any kind of a relationship with one another. As I have seen between me and my siblings, just because we share some DNA doesn’t mean that we share much of anything else – things like our sense of humor, values, and core beliefs are fundamentally different. To share an example from my life, the only communication I have with one of my brothers are the Christmas and birthday cards we exchange through the mail.
We can choose our friends but not our families. If the siblings who were so annoying when we were kids happen to become true friends and people who we choose to spend time with when we’re adults, it shouldn’t be taken for granted.
That said, it made Steve and I very happy when Valerie told us that she didn’t have any plans for the weekend so she was going to make the hour and a half drive north to see her sister. Knowing Valerie, she wouldn’t want us to know that she might actually like spending time with her little sister.
Up to now, Valerie has been very invested in developing plenty of sibling rivalry; creating less then flattering nicknames for her sister and teasing her at every opportunity. Just to keep up appearances, she made sure when she told us she was reaching out to her sister at Pepperdine it was because she was really bored. She made it sound like her social prospects this weekend were so dim that the choice was either go visit her sister or go bowling – which as comedian Jim Gaffigan says, is the activity you do when you’ve exhausted every other entertainment option.
Only time will tell if Valerie and Jennifer will develop a friendship that withstands the transitions of moving, marriage and kids. For now, they have something they can bond over: making fun of their old parents.