Trump's Cards

Trump’s always been one to call a spade a spade. She’s never minced words about anything. Ever. Wonder where she got that? She’s never been afraid to show her true feelings. In fact, she was the first kid in the family to really and truly throw fits. No no, not whiny little “I want some bubblegum” fits. We’re talking red-faced, screaming-at-the-top-of-the-lungs fits. Curly and I actually got a kick out of those…that was one thing we enjoyed together. Trump had this way of individually screaming each and every single word…it was performance art, really. If you were to describe her as “strong-willed,” that would be quite an understatement. She had an evil little laugh that went with that will of hers…still does.

Trump was a thumb-sucker. She carried around a cloth diaper when she went into thumb-sucking-mode. That wasn’t the strange part. That comes when I tell you that she insisted on having the corner of it wet. Yes, wet. As in, go-run-it-under-the-faucet wet. Just the corner, not the whole thing. She’d hang onto this cloth diaper and rub the wet corner on her face. I don’t think we ever figured out why that was so appealing. I think she’s finally broken that habit, though. It’s about time.

Trump ran around barefoot a lot and would get splinters in her feet. That wasn’t a big deal…that came when it was time to get the splinters out of her feet. She’d throw a fit. You read the above paragraph, right? So you can imagine Mom trying to hold her down while Dad carefully tried to extract numerous splinters from her flailing little feet. Well, Dad finally figured out if he’d just let Trump go to sleep, the whole procedure was much easier. So he’d come in at night after she’d gone to sleep and remove each and every offending splinter without her ever knowing. Well, I guess she knows by now….

I don’t remember many (evil) things that occurred between Trump and me (I’m sure she will correct me here). And the ones that did, Curly was usually involved somehow. On the days Curly and I decided to like each other, we’d lock Trump out of the upstairs bedroom and we’d play with Legos or Barbies. We’d also “accidentally” use too much Pledge on the wood stairs and make them a bit slick so we could “ride” down on blankets, pillows, and whatever else we could find. And I’m sure that Trump got an extra helping hand on a few of her take-offs from the top of the stairs. That turn in the middle was a doosie if you were going too fast.

We just did the normal stuff to her – you know, the stuff that all older siblings do to the younger ones. We’d help her climb up into a tree, then leave; leave her behind when we were riding bicycles, after wondering aloud if it was too dark to see snakes out on the road; and I made sure they were both on the opposing team when it came time for “pine cone wars.”

That’s what siblings do – torture each other, in preparation for the real, grown-up world. If we didn’t have such a hard time growing up, we wouldn’t be able to survive the real world.

Trump is now in college and gets to spend a lot of time doing what she loves - riding, training, and hanging out around horses and teaching other people to ride. She's found what the rest of us long for: a job that she loves. She currently has a boyfriend, although I have been too much of a slacker to come up with a name for him yet. And no, I don't want any suggestions, thank you very much. We all know how the last thing turned out.