Cease Fire

Who would have thought that a pampered cat and an oversized, Clifford-like dog could teach me a lesson on sibling rivalry?

For years, my four kids — including three boys born in three and a third years — as well as my cat and dog, fought like, well, cats and dogs.

My mistake, I think, was throwing creatures with very strong and diverse personalities together and simply expecting them to get along.

I remember my own childhood — with three brothers, two sisters and a menagerie of furry creatures — as being harmonious, and I believed my own kids would enjoy similarly positive relationships.

As adults, my siblings and I love, respect and trust each other. We rarely argue and genuinely relish the too-rare time we spend together. We share wonderful memories of annual family ski trips to the Rockies, during which we skied together all day and played heated games of Monopoly at night. We adored each other, and thoroughly enjoyed time with our parents.

I like to recall Sunday afternoons sailing on Lake Michigan, lively birthday celebrations, warm holiday dinners with our best-friend family and hours spent watching Saturday-morning cartoons, vintage Laurel and Hardy films and home movies.

Traumatic events only solidified our bonds. We drew strength from each other after our father’s premature death — when our ages ranged from 22 to 30 — and tagged-team trips to Hawaii when lung cancer struck our oldest brother. I savored my siblings’ support while my husband was hospitalized a dozen years ago (my oldest sister visited twice during that time, and also after each of my babies arrived).

Of course, I do tend to sugar-coat the past. My memories gloss over the early battles between my two oldest brothers, born just 15 months apart, which often ended in bloodshed. I forget about the relentless teasing that could bring any of us to tears. And, I ignore the fact that it took 14 years for my oldest sister and I to develop the friendship that’s now our lifeblood. Back in the day, my parents seemed to ignore the problems, which did, in time, disappear.

(To learn how my pets and kids struck a cease fire, please click here for the rest of my post at http://permissionslips.wordpress.com/. I alternate writing that weekly blog with my friend and colleague .)