She Went into Hibernation

This is my sister, Rhonda. I think it is her 9th. grade picture. She was a tremendous athlete and if she was a teen today she would undoubtedly be going into professional athletics. She was too good at sports to participate with the girls. She was the first girl in our county in Little League and she was better than most of the boys.

She was so good at basketball that the local amusement park, Camden Park, banned her from shooting for prizes.

She loved music. When she was in the 9th. grade my mom and dad bought her a disco machine. It had all the bells and whistles that a teen could want in the 70's. It had a light show, 8 track tape deck, record player and radio. It was awesome.

We never saw her again after they put the disco machine into her bedroom. We would bang on the door all day long to try to get her to play and she wouldn't come out. Sometimes she would tell us she would be right there but that was just a tactic to get us to leave her alone.

She went into hibernation.

We would kid her about it on those rare occasions that we would see her after that. She was popular at school. She didn't want anything to do with my brother and I.

I remember when she had her tonsils taken out in the 6th. grade. She was talking to everybody else for 2 weeks before she "was able" to talk to Billy or I. She would go from speaking to sign language in a microsecond if one of us were in the room. When we complained to mom she said that we couldn't force her to talk to us - that it would pass.

It never did.

She was the family tattle tale. We couldn't get by with anything without her running to our mom to tell on us - even if she participated in whatever transgression that got us into trouble. My mom would actually encourage her to tell on us (something I don't understand to this day). While Billy and I would be getting our lecture and waiting to get whipped, Rhonda would be on her way to her room (that was always her punishment) and laughing and pointing at us behind mom's back. It was hard to swallow but necessary if we wanted to live in peace.

Of course we did evil brother and sister stuff to her as well. One time we were playing follow the leader. We kept marching back and forth over a pile of dog poop until she stepped into it barefooted. Boy, did we chortle with glee about that one! She didn't speak to us for a week that time.