Something for me? What a concept!

Look very, very closely. Children what do you see? (obvious reference for paragraph 4)

So my birthday is right around the corner. I am excited because for the first time I am planning to spend it with a man. This was the same man with whom I spend my 26th birthday. That was not planned. I had had a really shitty day and he helped me to "knock the edge off" a crappy birthday. So this is the first birthday, I planned to spend with someone other than my sister and my parents. How excited am I? Words cannot even begin to express... Things are really starting to look up for me in 2006.

Or not.

My sister decides, after I tell her my plans, to invite my parents to come and spend my birthday with me. She tells them that I expressed my desire for them to join us. I am so pissed right now I could shit fire.

You see, my sister is a moocher. She mooches her way through her life. Whatever I have is hers despite any inconvenience her encroaching may cause me. So in addition to moocher, we can add cock-blocker to the list. I am so utterly and absolutely outdone by her behavior.

She doesn't want me to have anything. For, dear friends, if a man were to spend my birthday with me then that could possibly mean that I am getting close to him. If I get close to a man then that may ruin the good thing she's got going--me taking care of her. So now I'm in a catch-22. I love my mother deeply and I am not going to hurt her feeling by telling her that she can't spend my birthday with me. My only question is: does my sister have to come?

I want to get in the bed (well burrow further into the bed) and pull the covers over my head and never emerge. Can't I have just one good and glorious thing for myself? Is that wrong? Is it wrong to pull the carpet from under my sister's feet and not give a damn where or how she lands? Now, obviously I'm venting, but there is some truth to that statement. I am simply unaware of a better solution. I am so tired of taking care of a woman that is nearly five years my senior. The really disheartening part of matter is that I've been doing it since I was 22--paying her bills and listening to her bitch and moan about her problems as though I didn't have my own problems and responsibilities. So here we are at the seven-year mark. The honeymoon is over and I want a [clink on wine glass with spoon]

a divorce (a la Taye Diggs in "Brown Sugar").

I know she is my family; and, although it is hiding somewhere deep in the recesses of my body right now, I do love her. I just do not like the person she has become or the person that I am becoming as a result of her close proximity in my life. I am at a loss as to what to do. To top it all off, imaginary friends, she's angry with me. She's walking around the apartment slamming doors with her television up entirely too loud for the health of her ears. She's trying to get my attention, I presume, in a passive-aggressive manner. I am too past reason to care. I simply have no energy left to deal with her. I am tired and tuckered out. I cannot do it anymore--even at my mother's behest. My mother often tells me that every tub has to sit on its own bottom.

Well, big sister, let's test your mettle/legs.