Vicki

November 2008. I received a card in the mail, it was a pretty card, said I am thinking of you and it was signed Vicki. Nothing else. Just Vicki.  The return address on the envelope was unfamiliar to me as was the last name. I didn't know many Vicki's, a friend's mother  was named Vickie and one other possiblity..could it have been..my sister? We weren't raised together. Like I've said before my aunt got me as a five month old baby, then adopted me. I had a few memories of her when we were little. Once when I was about 4 I remember she was over and we hid under the bed because she didn't want to leave and I didn't want her to. They found us though. And another time we were living in a Orange Stucco house then, and she was there out in the back yard, maybe I was 7, she was 3 years older. I remember her picking up a dandelion and rubbing it over my hand and then hers, she grasped my hand and said "You are my sister."  When I graduated High School she came down from Michigan and stayed with my aunt and came to our house. It was a quiet visit, nothing much was said, we were strangers to each other, I didn't know about her life, she didn't know about mine.  After I married she sent me a beautiful white bed spread I kept on my bed for many many years, until kids and time turned it a yellowish and stained.  But the last time I saw Vicki it was 1987, my grandmother's funeral and I was pregnant with Jenna.  I was worried about my Mom and distracted and we barely spoke, maybe hi. And then the years just passed.  So now here I had a card in my hand with the name  Vicki signed on it and I had no idea what it meant? Did she want to get in touch with me? Why did she only sign her name?   It took me a week to find a card to send back, I wanted it to be as non assuming as her card was. But i did write in it, gave her my email address, asked if we could talk, if this was my sister. And a few days later I got an email and yes indeed it was my sister. We talked on email for a week or two, catching up, telling each other about our lives, I had two nephews and they were almost the same age as Justin. In fact she was pregnant when I was pregnant with Justin. I thought why didn't I know that?  She gave me her phone number, and I kept it for a few days. Nervous, worried I would call and we would have nothing to say. Email is different than phone, I was a writer, I could wax eloquent on an email or text, but in a phone call? Well, I finally got up my nerve one night when everyone was gone and I placed the call. We talked for three hours. About everything. I loved her  northern accent, loved that she laughed so much, that she was sarcastic like me. I loved that it felt like she was my sister even though we hadn't spoken in over twenty years.  We talked for a few months, trying to make plans to see one another, but yet still a little nervous about it.  I had told Mom right away about finding her again, she said oh that's good. But had little else to say, and I started feeling worried. Would this hurt Mom? She had been through so much lately, losing Dad. I was going to go up to my nephews high school graduation, but got cold feet, afraid of meeting all in her family at once, and Mom was starting to have memory lapses, and not feeling good. I think I hurt Vicki through that, I kind of withdrew, not feeling pressure from anyone but my own self, this is summer of 2009 and all things were starting to weigh on me. But Vicki was patient and understanding and caring and those last months of 2009, and when Mom had her stroke, she was supportive. She helped me through it too.  And finally, in April 2010 after we had already moved Mom in with us, my sister came to visit. I thought it might be awkward at first, but the minute I saw her face, and we hugged it was ok. We spent many nights that week up til 2 or 3 in the morning just talking. Getting to know one another face to face. And back up early the next morning spending the day just talking, talking, talking.  We had missed a childhood together, missed all those sibling moments when she or I would have probably been on each other's last nerve, now we were just grown up sisters, with a lifetime behind us, and though we might not have a lot of memories from the past, we had started making memories together that we would cherish forever.