The Truth Shall Set You Free

I'm a younger sister. In fact, since there are only two of us, I am the youngest sister. Anyone with siblings will tell you there are advantages and disadvantages to being the oldest or youngest. As the youngest, I always felt like I was the lowest ranking family member--I was the one listed last on the Christmas cards, I was the youngest household member if you didn't count the pets. I was the one who had been around for the shortest amount of time. This usually means you don't make any of the rules and you're at the mercy of everyone else. This can also mean that your older sibling is the boss of you. This is a story of how I figured out how to turn that around.

We were visiting my mother's cousin in Italy. I was 9 years old and I had to pee. As luck would have it, so did my sister. We both took a trip to the bathroom. My sister pulled rank and took the toilet. My consolation prize was the bidet, which she kindly filled with water. I wasn't too keen on new things and no one really explained that it was sort of like a sink for other body parts. It was just so foreign, and I wanted nothing to do with it at all. I thought I could hold on until my sister was done, but I couldn't. Looking back, I should have just gone there, pulled the drain, rinsed the thing and been done. I don't know why I didn't. Who can explain the workings of a nine year old brain? Anyway, I peed myself.

As it was happening, I could still remember the look of "Oh, shit, she really did have to go!" on my sister's face. I know she had to have felt guilty. She very wisely wet the rest of my shorts and helped me clean up so it wouldn't be obvious to the adults what happened. I remembered going outside and resting on a chaise in the sun so my shorts could dry quickly. We were in the clear. You'd think we could then put the entire episode behind us when no one caught on, right?

Wrong. This is where things got a little twisted. Every moment after this incident, when she asked me to do something for her, and I refused, I was reminded of it and then threatened with "I'll tell!" This meant she had a servant for weeks and weeks. I was old enough to fear the mortification of my parents learning that I peed my pants at nine years old. At that age there's really no excuse. I didn't think it through far enough to realize they might actually understand if they got the whole story or that pants peeing wasn't really punishable. I just wanted to spare myself from the embarrassment.

This went on for months. "I'll tell, I'll tell" loomed over my head anytime I stepped out of line. It was awful. If only I could have that kind of problem now. I didn't know how easy I had it, but back then it seemed like a colossal dilemma. Serve the older sibling or face certain shame. It was a miserable time.

I can't tell you how long it went on, but at one point I decided to call her bluff. It wasn't because I didn't think she would tell them, it was because I got tired of the burden I carried. I got tired of the threats. "I'll tell!" I heard and I responded with, "Okay. Tell them." And you know what? That was it. There was no more bartering, no more currency to the story because it just didn't matter to me anymore. It was better for my parents to know then to have to drag this secret around in fear. And in the end, she never told.

Locks and Ladders

I was cooking ground beef for homemade burritos when I got the idea to check the mail.

If I run downstairs and grab the mail and come right back, it won't matter that the stove is on. It'll take less than a minute.

I grabbed the key from the counter top and dashed out. What was the big deal about checking the mail? I don't really remember. This was during my unemployment sabbatical from work. My best guess is that I was probably looking forward to receiving a letter from my best friend (or from Publisher's Clearing House).

I pulled the letters from the mailbox, locked it and rushed back upstairs to the apartment. When I reached the door, I looked at the lock. Then I looked at my hand. In my palm was one key: the mail key.

With a sinking feeling in my gut, I realized that someone, in an effort to travel lighter, had separated the mail key from the house and car keys. Sure, it might have been me, but for now it was easier to blame someone.

I attempted the credit card trick with the stiffest envelope in my hand, but unfortunately for me, credit card statements do not behave like credit cards. I pushed the mail key against the keyhole, thinking, maybe?

No, it didn't work. The movies always make breaking in seem so effortless. Well, I'm here to tell you--it's not.

As my bad luck would have it, my husband wasn't due home for another two hours. He was doing a dinner program for work, which left me home alone with the cats, who were all locked inside with no comprehension of English and no opposable thumbs.

I had to think quickly; the beef was cooking.

My first stop was the apartment office. Everyone cleared out at 6, but I was hoping someone would be hanging around late, that maybe I could enjoy a happy coincidence after my shitty luck.

The place was deserted.

If all else failed, I could call someone from the office to get the apartment key so I could unlock the door. The catch was in the small print of the apartment lease. If you called after hours, it was 50 bucks. Fifty bucks! When you're unemployed on a sabbatical, the best solution is the one that's closest to free.

I ran back to the apartment (the beef was cooking) and tried to devise another solution. I went around to the back side of the building, to the grassy hill that my balcony overlooked. Even though it was just one level up, I was in no shape to attempt it.

The movies make scaling a building look so effortless. Well, I'm here to tell you--it's not.

I could hear the smoke alarm screeching. I thought back to the conversation we had with the apartment manager when we toured the building. She said one smoke alarm would set off a chain reaction throughout the apartments that shared the same building. I'm happy to report that this was a lie. The only alarm going nuts was the one in my apartment.

I needed another plan of attack (the beef was burning).

Our apartment building shared the road with a duplex. I could see this house from the balcony window and I often wondered how the occupants felt about having a five story building towering next to their back yard. Did they resent us? I approached the house, but I wasn't going to ask them this just yet. I was going to ask them something completely different.

You see, parked next to the house was a Comcast cable van. On top of the van was a ladder. With a ladder, I could easily reach the balcony and get through the door that I didn't lock.

The people in the house were nice enough, but I had to wait for the cable guys to finish up. This was understandable; when you wait a week for the cable guys to come by, and you take off work so you're available during the four hour window when they're supposed to arrive, you don't want to let some interloper swoop in to steal your cable guy.

I waited in front of the house, making sure to glance in the direction of the apartment complex with an eye trained to any smoke plumes that might be rising from the vicinity of my apartment.

Eventually the cable guys emerged from the house. This was when I had to put aside my panic and be charming enough to convince them that lending their ladder wasn't an invitation to a lawsuit.

Let me tell you, the charm worked like, well, a charm. The guys pulled the van closer to the building and followed me with the ladder in tow.

"Please don't fall," said the guy who was holding the ladder. I reached the balcony and threw a leg over the railing.

Strangely enough, what I was doing was a repeat of something that happened when I was a kid. My family had set out to run some errands on a weekend, and for some reason, we ended up dropping off my mom. My dad, sister and I went home. It was then that we realized my mother was the one holding the house key. Even back then, someone was carrying out the sinister plot to separate keys.

Without bugging the neighbors or hounding innocent cable guys, my dad calmly took the ladder from the shed and extended it three stories up, to the balcony on the top floor while my sister and I watched from below. From there, he climbed over the railing and entered the house through the sliding glass door.

The fumes of burning beef and scorched teflon hit my nostrils as soon as I opened the door. I turned off the stove, opened the windows and went back outside to thank the cable guys.

Lessons learned:
1) Be nice to your neighbors; you never know when you'll need to borrow a cable guy
2) Don't check your mail if you're cooking
3) Don't separate the keys, no matter how much someone insists.