I love my little sister. I have loved her with wild protection since before she was born.
But, would I be her friend if she were the new kid in class?
Ann doesn't have many friends at school. She does not go to giggly sleepovers; she is not invited to the movies. I asked her who is her best friend, and she said, "Phoebe." Phoebe is the class president and is nice to everyone.
Alas, Ann, the fidgety kid who always finishes her test last and sits alone at the lunch table, has fallen prey to phony Phoebe.
Last semester I did a photography project on Ann and her classmates. I followed the seventh graders from English, to recess, to lunch, sticking my camera in their faces all day long.
The night before she took me to school, I was excited. Ann was nervous. "Don't say anything about politics," she warned. "You have to take that black nail polish off, you look goth," and "I want you to bring your pretty bag so you can get compliments," she offered. Seventh grade is all about keeping your cool and looking good.
It's actually quite a sight to see when Ann enters that austere world of Catholic middle school. She was the only girl playing kickball with the boys, the only student to read aloud in class with a funny accent and the only kid to laugh out loud at her teacher's meager jokes.
Mom, Dad and the doctors say Ann has social anxiety disorder, especially around kids her own age, which is why she is so great with little children and people over 18. The two-year-old at the church nursery and the 62-year-old teacher don't judge so harshly as does the middle school cheerleader.
So, they say, her family is to be her friends. My sweet old dad and rambunctious mother are their own 12-year-old's best friends. I become one, too, when I visit home.
Being Ann's long-distant best friend is not so difficult. Usually, when I call the house she makes me guess the score of her basketball game (5-55), or tells me about the "beautiful, so adorable" baby down the road with green eyes. Then she hands the phone off to one of her other best friends.
The day Ann talked to me on the phone for more than three minutes, I was flabbergasted. "She's like a real sister!" I thought. Our parents weren't home, so she chattered on about her favorite new teacher, the team dinner at our house and the upcoming New York City trip with Hugh, her 53-year-old B.F.F.
Ann has other good companions: my friends and my brother's friends.
Ann will gladly bombard me and anyone I bring to the house with water balloons or snowballs, depending on the season. She will hide out in a tree and shout insults at high school boys while they barb back and speed off in their trucks. She will challenge anyone bigger than her to a wrestling match.
When she was in kindergarten, Ann captured the school bully in a headlock and kept him there until he bit her upper arm so hard it left marks for days. Hear my mother's friend - a school counselor - tell the story, and Ann was the hero of the playground. All of the teachers were rooting for Ann when she took down that mean bully. Both kids lost recess for a week.
Another time, our cousin - 12 years older than Ann - provoked her into a wrestling match. "You wanna piece of me?" he chided. "I don't want a piece of you. I want the whole thing!" she sassed right back.
If only she could be so brash with the punk at school who calls her "chubby tubby."
Kate E. Matthews is a senior in the School of Communication and a columnist for The Eagle. You can reach her at edpage@theeagleonline.com.
