My family tends to be shamefully irreverent most of the time, well actually all the time. It’s how we get our laughs. It’s a great way to go through life, never taking anything too, seriously.

My sister said to me a few years back, “I used to feel sorry for you and your birthday date, (the day after Sept. 11th), but then Dad died and I won the prize for the Suck-Fest birthday.”

In personal terms, her birthday is suck-festarama. As bad as Sept. 11th was, the sudden death of our beloved father the day before her birthday, wins in my book.

We grew up pretty tight, the irreverence between us, just one of our common themes.

Eighteen months apart and sharing the same room, sometimes the same bed, will do that to you. We are as different as the day is long. Dark and light. She was spectacularly tidy, (still is). I was a whirlwind of mess. (Something, I have thankfully grown out of. Except for my laundry room and my kids, two things I have never been able to conquer.)

She was a champion warrior, a natural athlete. I was the sissy, klutzy kid, who would rather sit in a corner and read a book than slip on a baseball glove. She was unafraid of the world, ready to take on anyone who challenged her. I was the one who hid behind her, peeking out to say, “Yeah, take that!” and then slipping back behind my brave, fierce little sister. She led. I followed her. She was determined, setting goals, never without a job, working her way through law school on her own dime. I was writing poetry, taking on a Que Sera, Sera, Doris Day theme for myself, all about the boys and the parties and the clothes. With her bright, shining accomplishments and innate sense of who she was and where she was going, everyone always thought she was the older one. It used to infuriate me. It was my birthright, to be acknowledged in my place of order, no matter how gratuitous I was.

People would tell me not to worry. That when I grew up, I’d love the fact that everyone would think she was the older one.

Yeah, right.

Three kids do things to your face and breasts and hips you can never earn back, unless you’re willing to go under the knife for a major transformation, shelling out several grand to reclaim your body.

Her skin glows.

And, I don’t even want to start on her figure. It’s depressing enough. Let’s just say, discipline has worked well in her favor. The marathon runner she is, she can still rightfully wear the same bikini that teenagers wear, looking every bit the part.

Life is so not fair.

We are, without a doubt, polar opposites. If we weren’t forced into this situation of sisters, we would probably have never been friends.

But, we are.

We have never left each other, no matter the miles and situations between us.

She’s a hotshot lawyer in the Windy City while I am slave to a houseful of really, sloppy ingrates. Her little corner of the world is filled with interesting, fabulous, smart people, travels around the world, marathons, noble causes, not to mention a plethora of world renowned restaurants and fantastic shopping right outside her doorstep.

She even gets to be in Oprah’s audience whenever she says the word.

I try not to think about it too much.

She went up to DC last week, to see the cherry laurels, blossom. Forgive me, while I reveal the gory details of my life here. But, I was really envying her the other day as I found myself in a situation so loathsome, I would have sold my kids to be up there in The Land of Pink Blossoms with her. She flashed into my mind as I was…um, pulling a beaded necklace that my dog had decided looked too delectable to pass up, out of her ass at an excruciatingly, slow pace so as not to have any beads break off and cause an even more vile extraction.

Only in my world.

But, even though her life is a shining fabulous gem compared to my sometimes, really gross existence, there is this one thing….

She is a karmic lightning rod for strange and calamitous events. In a lifetime, most people might, just might, experience one of the disastrous and weird happenings that happen in her everyday life.

She has been held up at gunpoint during law school. Like the fierce soul, she is, she went to court, giving her take to the judge on what sort of punk does this sort of thing, ensuring that he would learn his lesson in a long jail sentence.

She has been in train wrecks, news making, derailed train wrecks involving deaths and injuries. She has found herself in the middle of two, that’s two, separate bank robberies.