Little sisters are like keys that unlock the liberty inside of you that you didn’t even know you had. Little sisters, in so many ways, save us from our own selves. They are the “angels that carry us when our wings don’t remember how to fly.”

A little sister is funny because you spend most of your time "hating" each other growing up. She is constantly "in your stuff" and copying you and wanting to hang out with you and your friends. She wants to be able to do the same things as you and live to tell the tale. She will try to out-sing, out-dance, and out-live you on the daily. What's funny is, while you are acting annoyed by all the stuff she does, somewhere in there, she is growing up and becoming her own person. And you may not have even realized it.

A little sister is funny because she is the only person in the entire world who has grown up in the exact condition you did. She's the only person who knows exactly how your parents will react when they find your wadded up dinner thrown in the garbage. She’s the one who holds countless inside jokes just between the two of you ready to whip out at any moment. She’s the only one who knows your truly, unhinged, unsupervised, un-represented self. She knows how to tick you off like no one else and she knows exactly what makes you feel loved.

When you get out of the constantly-fighting-stage, you realize you make wonderful friends for each other. And somewhere down the road, you see her as her own person with her own unique set of talents and capabilities instead of just a noisy extension of yourself.

And when you see her as her own person, watch out!

She will blow your mind with the things she can do and you will find yourself wondering, "How did I miss the becoming of this insanely wise, talented, and beautiful person?" She surprises you with her talents and abilities but most of all she surprises you as a person.

Suddenly, you're incapable of looking at her as that three year old who used to steal your stuff. You see her as your most kindred spirit, as a person who has overcome so much to get where she is and you realize that she, in fact, has out-lived you in many ways. She has become a heartbreakingly beautiful princess.

Not a Disney princess or Red Ruby princess, not one with a perfect singing voice or an unstained dress or sparkling jewelry, but with a heart that sparkles as she goes and lips that hide the strangest things she's seen (including your own secrets), and hands calloused and skillful from all she sets her mind to.

You say, "Want to borrow my stuff? Here. You'll do more with it than I ever could. Can I copy YOU now? It turns out you know me real well, maybe better than I know me. Now would be a great time to watch and imitate this person who became while I was becoming."

You want to hold her hand— like you did when mom said you had to— except this time, it's your decision. This time, you feel as if you should present her with a crown every time you see her, saying, "Welcome to womanhood. I know you've been here a little while now, but I have seen how much you have overcome to get here and I have walked through some of it with you." You think, "She deserves her favorite kind of flowers everyday, with beautiful poetic verses lining each one so that when she sniffs in their smell, she breathes in all the good she may have forgotten she is." All you want is for her to know how much she is loved.

There is also a time you must mourn that you two will never be little kids again, under the same roof, playing and bickering and having the time of your lives, but you know you'll always have each other to count on. And that is what is important.

A sister is always a sister but maybe friendship starts at the moment you see each other as human beings, becoming your own people. Maybe a sister doesn't really become a sister till you see her as her own human being in all her beauty-filled self. Maybe becoming the human beings you are at these specific moments in all the expansion of time is just the start to what sisterhood is.