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I owe them the entirety of my knowledge.
It is an amusing contradiction, then, that I state with pride that I have never learned to
braid my own hair. But I never had to learn to braid my hair because my big sister did
that for me. My sister and I have lived on different continents for almost ten years now,
but not a single day goes by without me talking to her. I miss her every day.
Life has a peculiar way of reminding me of her absence, scattering subtle signals
throughout my day. Sometimes it’s the smallest things that remind me of her—the
rhythmic clatter of a mechanical keyboard, loud and insistent, just like hers. Or
sometimes it’s big and obvious things, like the sight of two little girls in a park, playing in
the kind of easy, unquestioning closeness that makes me yearn for her.
I am a generally happy girl, and that is all thanks to the girls around me. Whether it’s my
mother, my sister, my best friend who lives all the way in Saudi Arabia, or the girls who
were brave enough to compliment my outfit on O-Week.
There is an undeniable privilege in being loved by women, in existing within the wonder
of friendship, spending time with all my friends, whether it’s cooking, folding laundry, or
having deep talks that would absolutely fail the Bechdel test. At times, I forget how
much magic the world holds, until I stop to recall the deliberate imprint of wonder every
woman I have ever known has left behind.
My father always insisted I was destined for greatness, that I would one day leave a
mark on the world. Perhaps he was mildly disappointed when, at six, I told everyone I
wanted to be a princess when I grew up. This, of course, led to the inevitable questions
about my future prince– questions that entirely missed the point. My aspirations had
nothing to do with romance; they had everything to do with Barbie and the 12 Dancing
Princesses and the deeply appealing notion of eleven sisters. If Prince Charming ever
turns up, send him away. I have more important things to do.
These days, if you ask me what I want to be, I doubt I’d have a definitive answer.
Because, in the least self-congratulatory way possible, I think I’ve already
become exactly what my six-year-old self hoped for. I’m no official princess, nor do I
have a diamond-studded tiara or a country to govern. But I am deeply loved by the
women in my life, and if my childhood wish was about belonging, then I suppose, in the
most unexpected way, I got exactly what I wanted– and I found my eleven sisters.
Written by Alita Khansa Wirahman
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