You have to know that the three sisters, Oldest, Baby and Middle, love Big Brother’s truck. It doesn’t matter which truck he has at the time, whether he’s found one that’s bright red or brown. We adore the significance behind them. They are the epitome of Big Brother and many, if not most, of our memories include him with one.

Can we back track a second? I feel like I should explain something.

Is it important? You’ve updated us on a few things along this path that haven’t been relevant, if we’re being honest.

I actually do find this important, because it explains why…just listen. 

If you’re anything like me, you’re a bit annoyed that I don’t refer to the sisters as Oldest, Middle and Baby. Naming us off in succession would make sense for birth order clarification, but it wouldn’t work for us. Baby has always been in the middle. I even write her that way without realizing it.

Baby is front and center of Oldest and Middle sister. Don’t say it, okay? She’ll bite your head off. Maybe even ferociously attack, if you question her claim to us. Yes, in other words, we’re her…well you know what we are.

It rhymes with ditches.

Audrey Dawn! The language you’ve just required us to imagine…tisk tisk tisk.

I’m sorry.

Big Brother’s eyes were twinkling bright that December night inside his Big Red Barn. His role was to set up the emotion. In order to succeed he’d have to have music. You see, a man of few words needs a tool to help him along.

For Big Brother, that tool is a stereo. He has a way of making it remind us of who we were then and are today. He connects us once again and a sort of time warp begins. Suddenly, we’re in a two-tone gray house, and I’m playing the part of Mommy.

He had all three of us in his truck and ready for talks of yesterdays. Nothing is more fun than entertaining Big Brother. He loves it, and winning over the crowd is most of the battle while on stage.

He’s possibly easier to sell than I’m going to admit, but what do I know? I’m just his sister. His little sister, he has three of them. For Pete’s sake he needs to seem keenly aware of his manliness, and aloof towards his adoration for his sisters.

The stage was set and Oldest, Baby and Middle were going to go back a few years. I will or will not confirm that we’d had a little to drink. Maybe we did, maybe we didn’t have some courage, but what better time than when home with the family.

Egg Nogg should have more Egg than Nogg, possibly.

I think this blog should have more Nogg and less Aud…

Keep it up and I’ll take you to dinner. We’re a pretty good team, whoever you are.

Big Brother’s black cowboy hat I’d found, and as I placed it on my head, I assumed the role of driver. I nodded to Baby and Middle, found my theatric center, my Duck Lips and began. I pretended to shift the standard transmission into a low gear. I pulled my hat down and sang. We were low riding, for sure. We sang our hearts out together.

I began to indicate the Farmer’s Wave to the people we passed by. The Farmer’s Wave can be a few different waves. One could be the full hand over the steering wheel and parallel to the road wave. Another wave is the pointer finger wave, which translates into “I’m in deep thought, but I’ll acknowledge your vehicle because I know it’s you.”

Oh gracious! Please don’t offer to explain the other one finger wave…

Watch out, I’m falling for you. Let me finish my story.

This exaggeration causes Big Brother to nod and change the song. He chooses a song and turns to everyone and says, “That woman in the driver’s seat right now, is exactly who she was back then.” My hands had Big Brother’s stiff brown farming gloves on, too. I’d snuck them on when he wasn’t looking. When my arm appeared on the side of the truck while giving a thumbs up to the next song, he laughed. Oh, what I’d do to get that laugh.

My hand then appeared later holding the side mirror. My face held the look of a smooth operator, one that I can remember him using to get girls. Yes, he wore the cowboy hat most of the time. He’d finally belly laughed.

I love to see him laugh so hard that he spins around and begins to walk away to conceal his reaction. His guard coming down is never lost on his three sisters. We call that an invitation, you see.

It’s important to watch for clues like that when dealing with quiet or manly members of my family. Mostly, I notice I’m doing something right when they haven’t found something better to do. I suppose Big Brother gets this from my father.

Getting emotion or communication of any sort from them became my life’s ambition, as a child. Sometimes it was like kicking an empty can into the wind. I have to do twice the kicking, but that’s alright. It taught me a lot about how to approach people.

This is probably one of the biggest factors as to why I received my degree in people watching.

I think someone should probably give you a little insight into your behavior, Audrey. You seem a bit…

Be nice.

Baby came up with a plan. Oldest was to chug her drink. Toss it out the window and into the back of the truck bed, as we sang to our favorite sad song. Baby was setting me up well. I’d nailed it!

Big Brother ran up and sat on top of his truck cab just so he could be with us. His job was to enjoy the moment we’d provided.

I’d given Big Brother’s cowboy hat to Middle a while back, as it was made for her face. I wish you could see how well she wore it. She has cheekbones that go on for miles, the cowboy hat doesn’t wear her – she wears the cowboy hat. Can I get an Amen?! She was the arm candy inside that truck, and the best at getting the true laugh from me, Baby and Big Brother.

Looking straight through the middle of the windshield you’ll see Baby, she’s singing, too. Mostly demanding Big Brother to play something else, usually a song with more emotion. Something written to create tears. There’s a reason for that, too. Maybe one day we’ll share. I’d be holding back if I didn’t say that a lot of this was also for Baby. She loves having the four of us together. Middle and I take our job of making memories and sharing a laugh for Baby, a bit seriously.

Why, do you ask? Well, it’s all she’s known, from as far back as most of her memories go, it’s been the four of us working together, creating a plan and holding on for dear life. We prayed that God’s plan would work out.

If you recall, at the beginning of my story I accused my siblings of deliberately setting me up: I believe I was suckered into being made to look like a clown, but I’ll let you be the judge. 

I stand corrected. I was just being asked to do what I was brought into this family to do. I was to be their Oldest Sister with jokes and all. They call me Aud, Auddie or Sister, it’s who I am for them.

You see, four parts make a whole in our world. We aren’t who we are without the other three. Especially, now that we’re grown and away from each other most of the time. Eventually, we become just a shell searching for the power that close siblings seem to create inside each other. It is then that we know we need time together. We’re connected because of our tragedy.

Everyone has a tragic story inside of them. Big Brother, Oldest, Middle and Baby are going to be in my stories now. Come along with us. I hope you’ll feel like part of the family.

I once heard a poem. I haven’t a clue who wrote it, but it seems to fit me and my siblings:

One is spoiled

Two surely fight

Three ones left out

And four is just right

We all have stories to tell. You can tell me one if you’d like. Here’s a song that pulls the four siblings together and helps us connect. ~Blessings, Audrey