Our sibling relationships …close or distant, happy or not so happy have the capability of sculpting our life scripts. They have the power to shape our character, our histories and our future. Our brothers and sisters might not admire us always , but they remain interested in us , our lives , our successes and our failures forever. They are our partners in crime, our emotional punch bags, our biggest fans and also our worst critics, our team mates and can be our strongest rivals, our closest confidants who if they want can become ruthless spies and can sell us out anytime…they are people who know us the best inside out.
Life keeps moving, years pass …like they have been riding a bullet train…and we all get busy with building our careers and our new families. From sharing the same room, to different rooms in the same house …to different houses in the same city …to different houses in different cities or maybe different countries to living on the opposite sides of the globe. The distance keeps growing …..miles between siblings keep increasing ..physically and sometimes it’s heartbreaking to see them walking in opposite directions emotionally too. Some of us are able to keep the warmth alive,while others spend much less time investing in the relationships bonded by blood and end up taking them for granted. The brothers and sisters who we knew better than ourselves …..sometimes become strangers. And other times they keep working at being the security nets they have always been. Sometimes the rivalry remains, other times the memory of rivalries become the bridges to bring us closer. There is nothing half hearted in sibling relationships …the fevicol bonds, the fights, the love, the hate, the competition,the comparisons….all feelings and emotions that the siblings evoke in each other remain fiercely intense always.
And then comes a time when we become parents of siblings and see the story of their siblings unfold in front of us. Our children find their own punching bags, emotional hangers and secret keepers in their siblings. And we see our hearts warming up to their life stories and relationships.
Remembering today ….
All those fighting episodes with my siblings , pleading and touching each others feet to beg for that last bite of maggi left on the plate!
The fun, the pleasure and the power of being the whistleblowers of my brothers and sisters deeds to our parents!
Those beautiful lazy days and cozy nights of watching Pakistani dramas,Voyages of Star Trek Enterprise and Bold & Beautiful soap opera marathons!
All the cribbing, crying and ganging up against our parents unreasonable no’s and limiting rules curbing our independence!
All the wardrobe swapping ..a chance of expanding our choices of clothes with or without the permission of our siblings!
Tagging along with the friends of our older siblings and being pampered like crazy and spoiled rotten.
Those scooter rides and potato chips eating sessions on our way back home from college!
Having the easier way out ….with our older sibling making all the mistakes and us learning from them!
Cheers to my dynamic, larger than life older sister whose capacity to love, undying spirit and energy has been inspiring for me always!
Cheers to my sensitive, very positive always, funny younger brother who is my go to person forever!
Cheers to our old memories & Amen to many many more beautiful new ones!
And A big Cheers to my children and their awesome siblings. Hoping they too keep making lovely memories together forever!
( Dedicated to my sister on her Birthday.. 23rd June 2017)
SAAKSHI SINGLA 
Saakshi..this is a beautifully written and totally relatable write-up. The fact that I felt like owning up your words speaks of my admiration for this work of yours. Absolutely heart warming and refreshing!