Second-Daughter Syndrome

I've always felt there should be a book written about my family. There's something enamoring and captivating about an all-girl family -- how each daughter is so different in personality yet all are united by the unmatchable bonds of sisterhood (yes, yes, I realize I am completely biased in my statement.) It almost makes you want to "collect them all," if they were action figures, right?

I've also always imagined that I would be the heroine, or at least the narrator of the story.

Hey, before you start rolling your eyes at me, let me present the evidence for this. Think of the other stories about all-girl families you've read or heard. The most famous are probably the Bennett sisters in the much-loved Pride and Prejudice and the March sisters in Little Women. There are even the five daughters of Fiddler on the Roof (I can't think of their surname off the top of my head.) Now, who is the main character in each story? (Disregard Fiddler for now.) Elizabeth Bennett and Jo March, right? Both are the second daughters. Like me. And it doesn't end there.

You know the first daughters, Jane and Meg, and even Tzeitel? They are the role models, and always remind me strongly of my older sister, the first daughter of our family (just take the following comments with a grain of salt and humor me, Hatsuho.) They are obedient and wise and prettier and more practical than the second daughter. Thus, they don't get into as much trouble, and have the sense and good fortune to marry the first good, hard-working young man they meet. I'm not saying that my sister didn't have her share of challenges, but she has an impeccably cleaner record than me: she has never gotten a speeding ticket, been in a car accident, failed a class, gotten a detention in high school, been in debt, missed a deadline, or really been careless and irresponsible in any way. Basically, she hasn't done anything to cause my parents grief since she was a newborn, and even then I hear she was really good at sleeping through the night. Nobody really has to worry about the first daughter. I, on the other hand, have been and still am the complete opposite.

But I also like to think that I possess some of the good qualities of the second daughter: the dreamer and schemer with a love of writing, getting into scrapes but learning from them, taking risks, and hopefully in the end finding a man who adores her imperfections (another trend is that the younger daughters get married before the second daughter, and that's OK.) Now, I would be pretty happy with myself if I could also acquire Lizzie's wit, Jo's intellect, and Hodel's grace. There's always room for improvement, right?

So there you have it, some of the foolish and slightly narcissistic thoughts that go through my head as I go through this thing called life. You can agree or disagree with me, but I firmly hold that second-daughter syndrome exists, and that I am infected with it.

OK, now you can start rolling your eyes at me.

News on Views

I have reason to suspect that there are more viewers of this blog than just my sister Hatsuho, who I'd thought until recently was my lone reader and fan. So I've concluded that I should probably start doing more than a half-hearted job and add posts that are wittier, more exciting, and more grammatically correct. That's a lot of pressure I just put on myself. I give up already.

By the way, by the above comment I do not mean that Hatsuho deserves anything less than a half-hearted job, or a whole-hearted job for that matter. It's just that I know she would leave me a nice comment no matter what the heck I write. That's what big sisters are for.

Since I haven't written much this time, I'm going to use this space to reward Hatsuho for her loyalty by pointing you all to her blog here. It is a site that accurately portrays the life of my sister who likes crafts and all things "cute", and is more frequently updated than my blog. She is a second grade teacher which means she is a much more useful member of society than I am. Her blog is full of whimsy, pictures, and musings on married life that will make you smile, while my blog is full of sarcasm and lines that are meant to be clever but in actuality don't make you laugh, so you may wonder if we really are sisters in the literal sense. I assure you that yes, we are in fact blood-related. You may even notice that we both just happened to choose the same template. If that's not evidence of sisterhood, I don't know what is.

I'm secretly beaming inside right now because I'm so proud of myself for creating a link in the above paragraph. Do you see it shining up there in blue-lettered splendor? This is a milestone in the world of Sayakapella. I'm becoming so computer savvy I'm scaring myself.

Until next time, Hatsuho. Oh, and all you ghost readers who may or may not be real people.