“I could never love anyone as I love my sisters.” —Little Women film adaptation (1994)

I am a middle child of three. My sisters and I raised one another. It was our life and it was our normal. We have wonderful memories of the years we grew up together.

Yes we fought as sisters do. We laughed and were silly at times. We had inside jokes that we can still recall. We would sneak each other’s clothes, make-up and sometimes shoes.

My younger sister and I would play with the ‘grown up ‘ things of our older sister, her long gloves, her eye shadows. We looked at her prom dresses.

I married in 1975 and moved away. I missed decades with my sisters. Life with them was long distanced. I couldn’t do much at all. Snail mail was our only connection, except on weekends when rates were cheaper for long distance calls.

Email, text messages, cell phones have changed that. It’s wonderful. We all live apart from one another. Different states in different parts of the country is not how we dreamed it would be. We thought we would marry and live on the southside of our town, within walking distance. I often wonder how that would have been.

There are conversations we have where you feel a part of what they are doing. When my younger sister is walking her dog, I have done that with her, both physically and while we are talking on the phone. Those times as she says she is in the car heading home, I almost want to say, well, what should we do for dinner? It seems so natural to continue.

Last night I had such a conversation. The kind where you go beyond relaying news and weather. The kind of conversation where you want to keep talking into the still hours of the night. Talking about everything under the sun and nothing at all.

As I climbed into bed last night I thanked God for the blessing of my sisters. I know they are always there and would do anything for each of us at the drop of a pin. But there are times when although the knowledge is there, a hunger for a hug and a squeeze is what is needed.

Psalm 139:13 says,”For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.” (NKJV) This is one of my favorite scriptures. It reminds me that our Lord knows me intimately. As He formed me in my mother’s womb, He formed my sisters. He knows them intimately and He created us and put us together as family. His plan for us as sisters is still going on. Time, distance, life separates us, but the bond of being sisters is so much greater than all of that.

I am a middle child. I am blessed to be between two precious women. Thank you Jesus.