Disillusionment
“It’s a boy!” My mother exclaimed ecstatically.

My smile instantly faded. I looked over from the sonogram, to my mother’s expanded midsection, and then down to the floor where I had been tapping my right foot in anticipation of the announcement. Dreams of giggling late at night under the bed covers, brushing each other’s hair, and playing with my new Barbies in dollhouses shattered and my entire being filled with disappointment. My heart dropped.

Seeing my utter dissatisfaction with my soon-to-be baby brother, my mother smiled at me and turned to the nurse.

“She really wanted a sister,” my mother joked. She had no idea of my broken hopes.

My lips trembled at the mention of the word. For the remainder of my mother’s pregnancy, I supported her, hoping I was making friends with my new baby sister. I scrunched up my dress into my two small fists and felt my eyes and throat burning—the familiar hot sensation that occurs when I am about to cry. My small-minded self at the time refused to accept the fact that my expectations were not met. Sure, I was spoiled with attention at the time.

However, I wasn’t about to let go of my anger just yet.
Birthdays

It was around the time of my birthday, June 26th, when my utmost detestation came about from the presence of the infant.

“Josephine, could you get the bottle?”

No.

“Hand me his blanket, please.”

I don’t want to.

“Get his pacifier from the kitchen—and hurry.”

Why?

“I’m a little busy; we can play in just a minute.”

Tell me that when you actually mean it.

I came to despise my mother’s voice, unable to understand her stress and worries. The more I felt this hate, the more I directed it toward the infant. I swore I would plot revenge against it, especially since this year was the year I wanted to have my first birthday party. On my seventh birthday, I pitifully spent the day playing with my Barbies, tugging the hairs out of their plastic heads. I wondered for the first time why Barbies were so perfect.

Barbies could have birthday parties, couldn’t they?

Why wasn’t my life like Barbie’s?
Plastic

“My sister is so mean to me! I want to kill her sometimes!” my friend Gaby exclaimed.

Fuming, she stabbed her fork in her baked potato during lunch, effectively causing the grease from the butter to pour out of it. It was lunchtime and she had been ranting to me about how her sister always stole her hairbrushes and never played with her. I stared at the deformed potato and Gaby glanced at me.

“You’re so lucky you only have brothers,” she said, sighing, “All I do is fight with my sister.”

I looked at her, puzzled. Never had I considered myself lucky in any way to be the middle child, sandwiched between my two brothers. Most of the time, my younger brother would tease me and team up with my older brother to double my misery. His personality wasn’t exactly rotten, but the little pranks he pulled on me would bother me to no end. Being the only girl, I would frequently sob in my room after the mean tricks my brothers played on me.

However, I thought about it for a bit. I sort of unfairly placed my little brother in the wrong light just because he did not turn out to be a girl. Now that my brother was older, we had begun to play the little games that we both enjoyed. My tomboyish self and his eagerness to play games fit nicely together and we made up our own games; in fact, most of the time we would even play with my Barbies. Maybe I’ll try accepting him, I thought at the time.

In a way, the Barbies served as the toys that connected me and my brother. Strange as it was, we would play with my Barbies more than with his mini metal Hotwheels cars that my father would buy him. Perhaps he was the sibling that I had been longing for; all this time, I only resented him because of the fact that he was a boy. In a sense, he even made me proud. I could brag about the fact that I had a brother willing to play dolls and dress-up with me and listened to my requests. Whenever we played with the dolls, of course, we wouldn’t dress them up. That would be boring. We made up ridiculous situations for Barbie to live in, and even in some ways made her suffer.

Maybe Barbie’s life wasn’t exactly the life I had been wanting.

Even Barbie can suffer too, huh?
Real

My family arrived at my little brother’s baseball game, ready to cheer him on. He had been practicing for a while now, attending every practice he had in his league after school with his teammates. He was a decent hitter and usually performed great at first base. I sat down on the cold metal bleachers with the rest of my family and waited for the game to commence.


His hits were glorious, earning cheers from the bench and from the parents in the bleachers—though especially from me. Seeing his unbelievable swings and courageous runs toward each base, even scoring a homerun in the process, gave me goosebumps. He is my little brother, related by our blood bond. It surpasses the unrealistic, plastic hopes of yearning for something I was simply not given.

As I watched each swing of my brother’s baseball bat, I felt the excitement that my plastic, hard, fake Barbies cannot feel. Tucked away in a trunk in my closet, the Barbies no longer serve as the ideal life I wished I had. No matter what, I would not want to trade my little brother for any other sibling I could have had. Even though we may fight at times, I know that this life is ideal.

This is real.