Sister – principles
My sister was popular and was a good friend to her classmates. I had not been in touch with any of my childhood friends after I left home, but my sister had kept contact with some of them even while she lived in Tokyo, and they came to her wedding reception 15 years later.
Since she was very young, my sister was fair to others and saw goodness in each person, though she was also as strict with them about the moral standard, and wouldn’t tolerate a sadistic imbecile. There was a girl in her year who had a learning disability. While she often fell a target of mockery and insult by cruel boys, my sister and a few of her close friends stood in solidarity.
She was confident of herself, even if others laughed at her. When she started talking English lessons at 11 at the local church, a couple of years earlier than the Japanese school system started teaching it, boys would ask her the full name of America as a country. She’d proudly answer, “The U.S.A. It is an abbreviation for The United States of America,” with the “r” uttered in a rolled tongue. The boys would sneer at her pedant-ness, she remained unhinged, declaring she was telling the truth.