Miss Winstead looked at my scarred and bloody arms one morning after the Pledge Of Allegiance and morning prayer.  My fourth grade teacher asked me, “What on earth happened to your arms?”  

“My sister scratched ‘em,” I told her.  

“Oh dear,” she said.  “But your sister seems gentle as a kitten.  Well – I guess a TIGER kitten huh?”

“Yes, maam, “ I replied.

Well, “Tiger Kitten” is saving Mama.  Again.  Mama is 90 years old and in critical condition in an Orange Park, Florida hospital.  She has been hospitalized often the past five or six years.  This time, she has been in since late October of last year.   And, figuratively speaking of course, there are quite a few doctors and nurses in Duval and Clay Counties, Florida with scarred and bloodied arms lately.  My sister is fighting just as hard for our Mama as Mama is herself.  But this is a topic I wish not to discuss here.  This is about a sister who left me bloodied and scarred - emotionally as well as physically.

My sister is older than me by a couple of years.  And she is so much smarter than I will ever be.  Growing up, she never failed to point that out.

We have always been close.  She taught me to read and to do simple math before I ever even set foot in elementary school.  But we were competitive as well.  Our very first contests were drawing ones.  She is the most graceful and thoughtful artist I have ever known.  Well, thoughtful in the way she draws and paints and does other artistic things.  But she was very thoughtless when it came to beating me in drawing contests.  I usually ended up throwing something, storming out of the room and hating that girl.  Not because I clearly lost, but rather because of the way she handled her overwhelming victories.  She was brutal.

Eventually, we gave up on the drawing contests.  My fragile composure just couldn’t quite keep up with the intensity of so many defeats.  We moved on.  To Monopoly.  Here’s my estimate.  92% of our Monopoly games ended with me slinging the cruel Parker Brothers game board, her hotels and all, across the room and into the wall.  I used to think there was something wrong with me, that my hatred of losing was out of control.  I haven’t thought that in years.  Instead I blame my behavior on the smug way she said, “I will purchase yet ANOTHER hotel on Park Place, please.”

Well, I’m not sure why we stopped playing Monopoly.  Maybe our mother put and end to it.  Maybe I just couldn’t stand it anymore.  I’m sure my sister didn’t end our games.  She loved beating the crap out of her little brother.  So what did I do instead?  I agreed to play the home version of Jeopardy with her.  See, this kind of proves just how stupid I was.  She clearly had the superior intellect.  And she was a reader.  I hated reading, and I was slow, very slow, at it.  But I desperately wanted some way to beat her at something.  And she wouldn’t play basketball with me.  So I went along with Jeopardy.

The home version of the game didn’t come with electronic buzzers.  There were no “electronics” back then.  It came with those tiny and colorful metal “frogs” with a strip of metal on the underbelly of each of the frogs.  Once you push that strip of metal, the “frog” makes a clicking sound.  Now, I knew I was smart.  I made good grades in school.  So I knew I had a chance against her.  I was pumped.  “I can do this,” I thought to myself.

First answer?  My sister had ample time to read the entire thing and carefully place that damned frog at the tip of my nose and click it with a sort of graceful and obnoxious swirling and flowing arm and wrist motion before I could even read the first three words.  “CLICK.”  She would then sit straight up, sort of cock her head upward and to the right just a bit as she blurted out the correct question and smile condescendingly at her incompetent and frustrated opponent.  Second answer?  Same thing.  Third, fourth and fifth answers?  No different than the first.  We rarely got beyond ten answers before the plastic “answer screen,” the box with Art Fleming’s picture on it, and all those damned frogs hit the wall just like Monopoly.

She really was ruthless back then.  And I guess that was some pretty good training for what she’s had to deal with lately.  Tired and critically ill old people need some pretty ruthless advocates in hospital settings.  You know, years ago I kind of thought it would be good for me to become a doctor or other health care worker.  Well, I certainly didn’t follow that path.  And I am so very glad I didn’t.  I don’t think I could handle an adult career of dealing with “tiger kittens” like my sister.

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