Card night with the sisters

On the first Monday of every month, I play cards with my sisters.  The game is Golf, a nine-round game easy enough to be able to play and talk at the same time.  Talk and actually win is another story.

 This past Monday we took pictures.  From the left, Janie, Marilyn, Judy, me, and Toni.  I know, I look like their mother.  I AM the oldest. 

We play two rounds a night, add up the points and the sister with the least points wins.

We started out with one  medal for the winner, but ended up with lst, 2nd and 3rd place medals.  Last night, at Toni's, I said, "We should have booby prizes," and Toni turns, opens a drawer, and brings out two big black wooden Ls for losers. Her husband, Jesse, made them for us.  Thanks Jesse.  I'm pretty much a loser every month.  Of course, I can always say, that L stands for Louise.

I tell my sisters that lately I've been saying that I was raised by my parents in an orphanage.  "Like I never had a doll with hair," I say.  Now Toni jumps up to get the doll she got and still has--a doll with hair!  A bride.  Then she she says the real killer:  "I also had a Madame Alexander doll."

No, no no!  No one in the orphanage ever had a Madame Alexander doll.  That is not possible.  Our frugal mother did not run a thrifty  household by handing out Madame Alexander dolls.  Unless she got them with 500 books of green stamps or, bought it USED and had to have the head replaced.  I refuse to believe that Mother gave one of her daughters--not me--a Madame Alexander doll.  Maybe it was a fake Madam Aleksender doil.  I'll bet that's what it was:  a fake.

I don't have any of the toys of my childhood, because I didn't take care of my things.  Janie took care of HER things.  Why didn't she take care of my things as well?  It wouldn't have taken that much extra effort.

The only bike I ever had was a rebuilt Colgate.  Ever heard of it?

We tell stories.  In somebody's ward, the primary chorister is working the song to death by flailing her arms and bowing them into the shape of the sun and letting her fingers flutter down to show the rain coming down.  You know the gig.  These kids can't read, so you have to show them the words with your body.  When the song is over, a three-year-old in the first row says in a loud voice, "What the hell was that all about?"

When the phone rings, Janie says, "Oh that's Mother.  She calls me this time every night."  (She's been dead for five years).

Marilyn tells us her best time for sleeping is after five when Neil, her husband, gets up.  She can spread out in the bed and--and discover a half eaten peanut butter sandwich on his side of the bed.  It is smushed as if he has lain on it half the night.  Later that day, when he comes home and says he's hungry, she says, "Why don't you finish that peanut butter sandwich you started in bed last night?"  He doesn't even remember getting up and making it.

I love my sisters.  We laugh the same. We all sing alto. We're exceedingly anxious.  Not one of us would ride a ferris wheel.  We don't even ride the sky tram at lagoon.  I did once and hyperventilated through the entire ride.  Janie likes buttermilk and has a large, very large shoe size.  We don't hold it against her.