Never trust children

I've been wearing one of my step-dad's tee shirts for the last two days, from a 2001 "Pig Roast" my entire immediate family attended... except for my youngest sister, who was not yet born.

My family finds it ironic that the vegan is the one walking around in a Pig Roast tee shirt, and I have to agree, but it's the most comfortable baggy tee-shirt I've been able to locate after my surgery.

As a child I was dragged to these annual pig roast events; I never had much interest in them as a vegetarian and just generally as someone who thinks seeing a dead pig is disgusting.   But the host of these parties made them family-friendly events (if you consider watching a pig spin like a rotisserie chicken in a large bonfire kid-friendly), and went out of his way to make it a fun shindig.  There were moon bounces, games, lots of other food, and one year - a  dunk tank.

The 2001 Pig Roast - the shirt which I'm currently wearing - was the year that I volunteered to be in the dunk tank for a few hours.   As a 14 or 15 year old, I constantly bitched about any event my parents dragged me to, and the whining was particularly bad if it involved watching an animal roast with an apple in its mouth.  I suspect that asking me to sit in the dunk tank was a way to curtail the whining a little; if I was under water, no one could hear me complain, plus I was far enough away from the pig bonfire that I wasn't quite as grossed out as usual. 

As the product of my mother's first marriage, I have always been signficantly older than the kids of my parents' friends.   Family/friend events growing up were not so much entertaining for me, as they were an opportunity for people to use me as a free babysitter.   I sat in the dunk tank on a chilly Saturday in October, as a bunch of kids under the age of 10 skipped the part where they were supposed to throw a ball and see if they could knock me in, in favor of just running up and pushing the button so that I'd fall into the water every time I had barely even taken a seat inside the dunk tank.

I considered this an easy baby-sitting job, as the children were all uninterested in leaving the area around the dunk tank, and while it was exhausting to constantly fall and have to climb back up on the bench, at least I didn't have to chase children around the large backyard.  Rachel, my middle sister, was 3 at the time, and already learning how to torment her big sister.  She was perhaps the worst perpetrator of "cheating" at dunking me.

Today the tables turned a little; as my mom left to run some errands she yelled as she walked out the door
"Rachel! Watch your big sister!  Make sure she walks around."

Engaged in an intense game of battleship with me, my sister mutters "Sure,"  then refocuses on sinking my submarine (she won, but only because once again, she cheated).   Positive that my sister would forget by the time we finished our game, I ignored the fact that my mom told my 11 year old sister to babysit me.  Mom and I have had a debate over the last several days as to whether I've been walking enough (as this activity is supposed to prevent me getting blod clots), and I guess she trusts Rachel to manipulate me into walking.

Understandable, as yesterday she successfully manipulated me into going for a walk around the house.

"Steph, come here I have to show you something!" Rachel called me up to her room, and I dragged myself off the couch after she refused to tell me what she wanted to show me, as I have a weakness for mystery.

I get into Rachel's room, and she exclaimed "Oh, I think it's in Jordan's room."  We walked over to our other sister's room together.

By the third room she dragged me to, I realized there was in fact nothing to show me and that she was manipulating me into going for a walk against my will.

Normally, this is the point where I would tackle and tickle her, or pick her up and hold her upside down, but that seemed unwise given my stitches and the fact that I'm not supposed to lift more than 5 pounds.

For now, I just have to accept that my 11 year old sister is good at manipulating me, and good at cheating.  I'd like to say she learned from the best... but I think she's better than me.