As If She Never Left

           From before I can even remember, I have been close with my older sister. At only two years apart, we would do everything together. We would be put in matching outfits. Play together constantly. I would sleep in her room every weekend night. We pulled all nighters together. Naturally, as siblings, we had our fair share of fights. She would be bossy. I would be annoying. But we would always make up and be laughing together in a matter of minutes. She's the person I looked up to for everything. She could do no wrong in my eyes. I was never apart from her for more than a few days, and even that was weird. This is going on week number three of her summer program six hours away at the college she will be starting at in the fall. So one can imagine how my entire family has been feeling without her there.
         After my sister left for her program, we tried to focus on the few good points of her leaving. We can start cooking more and more things with meat that her and her vegetarian ways would not enjoy. We could go to movie theaters that she detested. We could sit in her spot on the couch. We managed to fall into a routine without my sister after she left. It was weird, and definitely felt like something was missing. Now she's back home for the weekend. Three weeks have gone by, and it's like nothing has changed. Like she was just at a friend's house for a couple of nights. It doesn't feel like she'll be leaving us again in a couple of days. It doesn't feel like we'll have to get used to life without her again. We already did that, shouldn't it be over?
        It's amazing how we went through our whole "withdrawal" period, managed to cope and come up with a new routine of life without the constant presence of my sister. Now she's been back for a few hours, and life without her seems like a foreign land once again. I know every younger sibling will have to go through this at one point or another. My sister must go off to college; start her life independent from her family. But a lot of sisters aren't as close as we are. My whole family is too used to having her always...there. I'm too accustomed to being able to stop in her room if I ever needed help, advice, or just to lift my spirits. One can't help but be happy around her. Limited contact through a couple of daily texts, and a fifteen conversation through a fuzzy Skype picture isn't enough.
     She's been in her summer program for three weeks. Last weekend we visited her. This weekend she's visiting us. What in the world am I going to do when she's at college in the fall...?