Alpha Biographies

Letter: O

O is for Odyssey

I can’t remember much of my life being an only child. I was only about 3 ½ when my little sister Emma was born. At the time, I was ecstatic, I would finally have someone to play with! Little did I know that was entirely wrong. I lost my position as my parent’s first priority,  all they seemed to care about was the new baby. Once she got older though, I grew to like her more and more. I used to call her “Emma Eyeballs,” a name I thought was hysterical at the time. By the time she was 4 and I was 8, she was like my best friend. I would come home from school everyday and go get something for both of us to play with. I was perfectly happy having one sibling, and one sibling only. But then that changed. I got home from school and did my usual routine of finding something to play with. I ran upstairs, got what I wanted, and came down. I hit the bottom stair and saw my parents standing there, clearly waiting for me to come back. They weren’t all cheesy or parent-like when they told me, they didn’t bring me out for ice cream or make me sit down and hug me or anything. They just told me. I was going to have a brother or sister. Brother OR sister?! They didn’t know?! I might have to deal with a BOY!? That was basically 8 year old Me’s worst nightmare. A few months later, my dad picked me up early from school to tell me that I was, in fact, going to have a brother. Cue inner hysterics. I tried to act excited, but on the inside, I was freaking out. It was official, not only was there going to be a new baby again, it was going to be a boy. A few more months passed, and my aunt came to pick my sister and I up so we could go to the hospital and see my brother. Unhappy-8-year-old me pouts the entire car ride plus all the way to the room I knew contained my new problem. Er, I mean, brother. I walk in, and the first thing I see is a tiny little hospital crib in the corner. I walk over, and see a little baby lying there in just a diaper. He had the cutest blue eyes, and he was doing the little tongue thing babies do when they stick their tongue out and it takes up like their entire mouth because they don’t have teeth. I stuck out my finger for him to grab, forgetting all hatred I had once had for this baby. He grabbed it and continuously squeezed it as if he doubted that it was real. And in that moment, I knew. I knew that it wasn’t going to be as bad as I thought, that this little boy would be the best brother anyone could ask for and that he wouldn’t act like the younger siblings on tv. He was my baby brother, and nothing was going to change that. I knew no one was going to take him away so I didn’t have a brother, a thought that had crossed my mind over the nine months that he wasn’t here. But in that moment, I knew that I didn’t want that. My brother was going to stay with us forever, and for the first time in a while, that’s exactly what I wanted.