Evel Knievel She's Not.....Even If She Thinks She Is!

Her name is Kathi, she is my sister, my "older" sister. I have already introduced her to y'all, she is four years older than me and I was told when I came along she was really protective over me, course she also was very bossy to me. But she was and still is a great sister! I mean she could do it all, she was the cheerleader one moment and my wingman the next.

There was a time when I was in the third grade and there was a forth grader who picked on me every day on the bus ride home, she wouldn't help me, she knew I could only take so much and she was waiting. It was one of those lesson things, she knew if she stepped in it would make it worse on me, so she stayed out of it, but she kept her eye on me. Then the day come that I had had enough, I told him to stop and he stood up and pushed me, well needless to say I let him have it, mom always said I didn't have a temper, I had a Tempature, I had to reach my boiling point. Well I got put off the bus for a week for fighting, So did Kathi, see what I didn't know at the time was two of his friends tried to jump in on me, but my sister put them in their place.

She liked picking on me early in life, I mean, I'm not saying she did anything like sitting on me tickling me till I peed or something, she would never do anything like that, no never. But I do remember when I was small hollering for dad when I had enough and him saying "Sissy, you better stop, one of these days that boy is gonna grow up." Well not to get ahead of the story, but that day came when we moved to South Carolina, Kathi stayed up here with grandma. I hit my growth spurt, went to 6'1", she came down to visit and start her junk, I just grabbed her swung her up on my shoulder and started bouncing her around and what did dad say? "Boy put your sister down right now!" Now I thought my day had finally come and he turned on me, oh well.

Kathi is only 5' and about 110lbs, yea I know, real scary, well you didn't grow up with her, naw she was great. Even though she wasn't that big, she thought she was a giant, if there was something that bordered dangerous, she was in and why not if it went south, she'd just blame me. But she was tough back then, swing on vines, ride pulley down a cable over the pond, I'm not talking about those safe ones you ride on vacation, hunt, shoot, oh one time when we had a big snow, she rode down Flowes Store rd behind a gmc 4x4 truck on the hood of an old car, rode our dirt bike like a boy.

Oh let me tell you about that motorcycle. Growing up on a farm was a balancing act, lots of hard work, lots of fun times, lots of lessons taught by corrections, but a lot were life lessons, mom and dad had a way of teaching us things we needed for life. We wanted a motorcycle (small dirt bike) now dad could have bought it for us, but he had another idea. It was summer time and he told us he would let us get one, but we would have to pay for it. So he got us a Charlotte Observer paper route and he drove us around in the middle of the night letting us run that route until we had enough to get that bike. That was one of the best things he could have done for us. Dad was good at teaching that way.

Well about that time mom and dad was starting to build their house there on the farm, they had dug the basement and was waiting on the brick mason. Just a big hole in the middle of the field. Now Kathi at this time had a boyfriend at school name Danny Christy, they were about twelve getting ready for middle school and this day mom had went by Danny's house and picked him up and brought him to the new home site. I knew my mom and his knew each other, never figured out how but, oh well.

That day everything was going just fine till Kathi had one of those tween moments and thought she had to impress her boyfriend Danny. Dad was cleaning up around the basement hole when he heard the dirt bike crank up. We turned to see Kathi riding up away from the house, then all of a sudden she turned and started a run toward the basement foundation, helmet on, leaning over the handle bars running wide open. Surely she not? She couldn't think she could? Oh my goodness, she is going to JUMP the house foundation......Not! Dad stepped in front of her just in time.

Then came one of those lessons I was talking about. She grew up to do a lot of great things, but she never got to play Evel Knievel. Thank God!

Thanks for reading and remember Do yourself a favor and take someone to church Sunday. God Bless Big PaPaw