getting along

Just to be clear, I didn't spend every waking hour of every day thinking of ways to haunt my sister. We did get along. Especially when I was getting her to "do things". I take a lot of credit for her gymnastic abilities. I certainly helped her flexibility. I also helped her to not have certain fears. For instance, when she was around 3-4 yrs old, I introduced her to the joys of the swing set.

We did not have your run of the mill, backyard variety swing set. This thing was the grand-daddy of swing sets.
Super heavy duty, play ground worthy and made of steel! For extra safety, my dad then cemented it into the
ground. Oh yeah, it was that massive. It had your basic swings but on one end, there were a set of parallel bars about 3 ft high.The other end had a pull-up bar that was adjustable in height but came in somewhere around the 5ft mark. Cool.

I convinced my sister that she had a future in the circus (or something like that). She could walk on the parallel bars with one foot on either side. Once we mastered that, it was time for tight rope practice. I coached her through all of it from my position safely on the ground. I was at least 7yrs old and smart enough to know this was probably not a good idea. But, she didn't know that. SO, carefully, out onto the pull up bar she went. I know at some point I even got her to climb to the bar that runs across the top where the swings hang from. She was not, however, up there the first time my mom saw her. Luckily, she was only standing in the middle of the pull up bar. She did not suffer a single broken bone in her childhood! Just in case you were worried. I didn't get into too much trouble as everyone seemed to be ok. She continued to climb on the bars and walk on them even with out my "coaching".

As for the swing set, it has also survived. We even dug it up and moved it with us. It's still set up in my parents yard, re-cemented in, of course. A tree fell on it awhile back. Bent the pull up bar but didn't knock it over. Yeah, it's that massive. Cool.

I have to say, my sister got very good at climbing and has impeccable balance. She is also a roller coaster adrenaline junkie now. Connection? I don't know but I will take some credit.