Hey, little sister.

My parents separated over nine years ago, a split that I knew would happen from the time I was ten or eleven years old. They have both been in relationships with wonderful people for a few years now, and I consider myself very lucky that things have worked out so well for all of us. But in all these years, what never once occurred to me until earlier this week is this: if my mother marries her gentleman, I will have siblings. (My father’s girlfriend does not have children.) In the twenty-five years I have known that my parents might one day be in different marriages, somehow this thought had never crossed my mind. This doesn’t stir any particular emotion for me, other than wonder that in my thirties (or forties, who knows?) I could suddenly become someone’s bratty little stepsister. This is an absolutely fascinating proposition.