The Yellow Sweater and other Crimes

The following is a family crime that at turns annoys me and makes me laugh hysterically.

My sisters are all much older than me. Much, much older. Now, I hope they finally read my blog so they can complain about that terminology. Due to some crafty math, good genes, and a little plastic surgery in one case, they've manage to slow aging to a crawl.

In real life, all of them are fifty plus this year and I'm stilling hanging on the ass end of my thirties with a death grip. That's life. You get old or you die. Both smell pretty bad.

Because of the age difference, I missed out on the sisterly bickering, fights, back-stabbings, and the yellow sweater. The three kids before me were boys. My testostone buffer so to speak.

I don't believe all three of my sisters have lived in the same house together since the 1970's.

Yet occassionally one of them brings up the yellow sweater. Over the years, the details have gotten ragged, the story complicated, but the bitterness has never faded. As far as I can tell, this is what happened.

My oldest sister, J, graduated high school and purchased a lovely, brand new, tags still on it yellow sweater from her work cash. In a family of eight kids, new was rare. Brand-new, well that was something to talk about.

Now in some versions of the legend, my second sister, R, bought the sweater. But I believe this to be a fallacy. First, she married at 18 and if she was still living at home, she was single and poor like everyone else.

J bought the sweater. R borrowed the sweater. R said she had permission, J said she didn't remember giving it but even if she had, she would never have agreed to let R loan it to the third sister, E.

The sweater came back stained and stretched out.

J had a hissy fit.

All my sisters are flat chested to certain degrees. A, Double A, and Triple A in bra size. If you don't know what a Triple A is, look at a slice of bread out of the toaster. It has about as much boobage as a Triple A bra holds.

To this day, someone will occassionally bring up the yellow sweater. R claims E stained it and stretched it out. E, while admitting to wearing the sweater with R's permission claims there was no way she stretched it out (triple A) and she doesn't remember the stain.

Since she is usually smudged in some way when claiming this, we believe half her story.

R says she did nothing to the sweater.

J says no one had permission to wear her sweater to begin with.

This same arguement has now went on for more than twenty-five years.

The sweater is long since gone.

The sisters have worked their way through several wardrobes, styles, and husbands and still they discuss this 'crime' in their youth.

And to be honest, the whole family looks hideous in yellow. Liked curdled lemon peels.

So, right now, I'm confessing...I TOOK THE SWEATER. While I was toddling around the house in my diaper, I put on the sweater, stuffed the front with grapefruit and ate dinner.

Then I climbed into J's closet and hung it back on the rack even though I've never voluntarily hung anything up in my life.

Now can we all move on?

Nope, I probably ower 15.49 for an ugly misshappen yellow sweater.

Tirz