What a Sistermoon vacation with your sister looks like

Molly has lived in New York for over a decade. We have been best friends since I was born, except for that brief stage where she liked her cat stuffed animal Felix better. We lived together in college. We talk or text every day. Many times. Often on speaker. Just doing our daily lives while periodically chatting but mostly containing the chaos around us. She has two kids, four and under. I have three kids, five and under. It’s busy.

If I don’t hear from her for a day or two and she hasn’t responded to my 17 phone calls, I’ll text her husband. The last time this happened, turns out they were at their anniversary dinner. OOPS. Sorry, Aron! Real romance means interruptions by your sis-in-law.

A sistermoon is like a honeymoon, only the romance is replaced by sisterly talking. And the hours in bed are for doing said talking. Or watching Men in Black III because they filmed some of it on her old street in Manhattan and we were trying to spot it the whole time (didn’t see it, still loved the movie), followed by hours of exegesis on the merits of different schooling methodologies.

When the cabbie asked us how we met as we rode to the airport, away from the Florida paradise, we said, “Our parents introduced us.”

This is what our sistermoon looked like (in case you didn’t follow along on instagram or her instagramz):

Necklace from Far & Wide Collection, a gift from my sister!

Sleep. In bed by 8pm. Still awake at 7am, but at least we were in bed early.

Talk. Talk. Talk. Talk. Talk. Stay up late talking.

Share a kingsized bed with someone who is not your spouse or your baby.

Laugh. Snort. Laugh.

Eat food prepared and cleaned up by other people.

Lay down by the pool.

Cover face with hat and nap.

Don’t do any of the working out you planned on. Eat dessert. Lots.

Talk about things no one else would ever want to rehash. Like high school. Grade school. Sports teams. Failed relationships. Pets that died. Things only your childhood best friend would remember or care about.

Process every feeling you think you *might* have felt, only to discover at the end of thirty minutes that, nope, you didn’t really feel that way. And she’s not even miffed you wasted thirty minutes. Because you have days more together.

Have a conversation that’s not interrupted by her kids or your kids or time or work or spouses wanting to know *deep within* will she ever get off the phone with her sister??

It was genuinely hard to say goodbye. I’ll see her at Christmas along with my other best friends (yes, the two other sisters and brother know I love them equally), and all our spouses and kids and parents and the thrill of all being together). But after four days alone, I wanted to go back in time to pre-families, to that precious sister time we had when we were each other’s primary responsibilities, when we worried about each other with the same fervor we worry about whether or not our kid has made it to the toilet.

I love being her little sister. Even though my feet are bigger.

I hope and pray you get a tiny sliver of vacation with that special best friend in your life, your sister, your sister-by-choice, your tribe. I don’t feel guilty about leaving my kids with my generous family at home, nor spending the money to make it happen. Because I really truly needed this. And I’m a better mama & wife & daughter today after it! Albeit a little sunburned one.