I have to get something off my chest. I’ve been feeling the tiniest bit like a hypocrite since my last post where I confessed to the fact that I don’t actually like to carve pumpkins. Mostly because for the past ten-ish years I’ve been giving my brother a hard time about this very thing. I often refer to my brother as “dead on the inside” (in the most loving way possible, I assure you. ) because he doesn’t like to decorate for the holidays, he hates to dye Easter Eggs, he doesn’t enjoy carving pumpkins, and then you add on things like he has never watched Dirty Dancing, and has somehow established himself as the Harry Potter expert in our family EVEN THOUGH HE HAS NOT READ ALL THE BOOKS!!! (ok this last one is maybe just a personal pet peeve of mine) All of these things contribute to the running joke of me telling him he is all dead on the inside.

Full disclosure, my brother is a wonderful human, AND an amazing public educator. I don’t think you can actually be successful or even drawn to public education and interacting with the youth of America if you are actually “dead on the inside” but I still like to give him a bad time, as is my right and my role as the pesky younger sister.

Of course, in my adulthood I have come to realize that maybe his adverseness to singing all the verses of the 12 days of Christmas while sitting in the hot tub, getting the perfect shade of neon pink onto hard-boiled egg shells, and reading scratch-n-sniff holiday books might have less to do with him being “dead on he inside” and more to do with the fact that the person initiating all of these projects was me, the pesky little sister… Le sigh. Perspective and all that jazz.

And here I am, 33 years young, realizing that I also don’t really enjoy carving pumpkins. Maybe I need to cool it on the “dead on the inside” comments, or at least acknowledge that there might be the tiniest part of my glittery, crafty, stylish and creative self that is also a little bit dead on the inside. At least I know I am in good company.

For your enjoyment: Here is a link to my brother’s podcast, in which he interviews Educators from McMinnville High School and offers insights into personalities, projects and methods of teachers in the public school system.   They are really worth a listen.