My sister was what we Druze call a “talker.” It is a difficult word to translate. A talker is one able to say things as a child that related to her past life. Those who follow the Druze faith believe in reincarnation. “Talkers” were not rare among us. She began getting into trouble at the age of three. When she was given a sandwich for dinner, she refused it, saying she would only eat if the dinner table was set, she was too good to be given sandwiches. She told everybody that when she lived in Jabal al-Druze, in Syria, she always had lavish feasts for dinner. She stomped her feet when she was asked to bathe. She wanted her old bathtub, the one with intricate turquoise-colored designs on the side. She asked to be taken back to her husband and children. Usually such behavior is taken with a degree of acceptance among Druze families, allowing the child some leeway until she adjusts to her new life. It is considered normal. Unfortunately, Lamia was insulting the family so she was made to shut up. She was forced to eat sandwiches, use cutlery not made of silver, and bathe in a regular porcelain bathtub. It was at that time that she began to withdraw.
When my grandfather began investigating her previous life — one goes to the area where the “talker” was supposed to have come from and asks around to see who died at the time of the “talker’s” birth — he discovered that what Lamia was saying was true. She had come from a rich, landowning family and had three kids of her own. Apparently she had lived a normal life, married to an ostentatious man who constantly berated her for not being perfect. On the day she died, she took a saber to her husband’s throat, slashed it, and killed herself, leaving her children orphaned. Those in the village from which she came warned my grandfather that if her soul was back, our family should be wary. We were not. My grandfather told my father who told my stepmother who told me. It became a tale, an interesting family story. No one mentioned anything to Lamia. In her letters, though, it was obvious that she knew the exact details of her life in Jabal al-Druze.
I had always thought I was the one who took after my mother. After all, I inherited her exotic looks, her artistic tendencies, her mood swings, her Americanness. I was the one who was perpetually lost, always trying to find myself in the rubble. But in the end, I realized it was my sister Lamia who took after my mother. She inherited her insanity.
It is quite possible that I am not the best person to describe my sister or to speak for her. I am biased and cannot write objectively about her. I will let her speak for herself:
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Dear Mother,
My husband is very strange again because about five weeks ago, he bringed a mannequin home for what reason he will not say but I don’t know how to say mannequin in english but you know what I mean like the big doll. The children have liked it in the beginning and they called it Madonna but not too long and they don’t like it anymore, why I don’t know, and I wanted to throw her out but my husband he said we might use her some day but I did not like her naked all the time so I dressed her and put a wig on her hair and The children liked her now so I put her in the salon room in one of the couches. Well I liked the way she is looking now and I start to dressing her in different every two or three or four days and I put makeup on her face and I gave her some new looks wonderful and it was fun and so the children talk to her as if she was someone human being. But my motherinlaw thinks its realy crazy but I said to her maybe she better talk her son because he says he want her in the house at the beginning so she said I should not be dressed her but I told her Madonna only wear things I dont’d wear because I don’t have a body like her and she is very thin, don’t you think and I can’t get far away with what she puts on. Why is she blaming me all the time?
I argued another time with my father because he still has the same temper. He got upset with me because I gave Ashraf some Cypro and hee said only doctors are suppose to proscribe strong antibiotics and he was so holyer than thee but He agreed with me that all the symptoms of Ashraf’s were a bacterial infection, but he thinks I should have talked to a doctor but I think he just hates me. Amal selfproscribes valuums and Majida takes Prozac whenever she has depressions like candy and bonbon but if I give my son antibiotic, I did the wrong thing, don’t you know? You know of course that Ashraf was better and it was the right thing to do of course but my father didn’t said to me that I gave him the wrong medicine but only that I need to talk to a doctor. He went on and on and on like running water all the time about the danger of all medicines are over the counter in this country and as if that had anything to do with me so I said to him what can I do about that but he didn’t tell me so he treats me like a little girl who doesn’t know right from wrong. And my husband doesn’t do anything because the fat thing only sit there and let my father shout at me and I keep thinking that one day, he shall’ll stand up for me and tell my father stop but he doesn’t know whats going on so I told him a couple of time that if my dad shouts at me it means he’s insulting him since he was the man of the house and not my father who isnt the man of the house at all, don’t you think? He doesn’t understand it and I dont depend on him for anything because its all up to me and I am the rock of Gibraltar and My husband is a weakthing and he can’t even answer up to his own mother, so how can he answer up any one personne like my father. People will always run all over him and ride him and wipe there feet on him like a outdoor carpet and he lets them because he’s been passed over for better job at work over many hundred times. I swear on you, if he didn’t married me, he would’n’t have gotten anywhere in this life but being with his mother at home all day crying over spoiled milk. Do you watch ER? I watch every show even though the children try to harass me during the show but I like it because it shows how much better American hospitals are than Lebanese hospitals and much better hospitals and all the nurses and doctors are pretty and they have all the best machines and none of the patients are as demanding as the patients are demanding in Beirut. My father still doesn’t give me enough appreciate me and I have to say to him all the time that I am a nurse and I am a good nurse too But he doesn’t see that, does he, but I’am just happy that we don’t work on the same department because I swear on you, he treat the philipino nurses better he treat me. Because at one time when we were over at his home to have dinner, he start talking about a procedure he did on that day and then he looked at me with a bad smile and asked me what uterus was in Arabic because he was just making a joke of me because I study nursing in Cairo and start to learn anatomy in Arabic as if that make my nursing degree bad, Can you believe that? If I had graduated from the American University of Beirut, then I was a real nurse and as if it was my fault that we had a war and I go to Cairo to make sure my family is safety and you know, at the least I have a degree, don’t you think? I’am the first woman in the family to come out a degree. Sarah says she graduates from Barnard, but I know she is lying, she is, and she does’nt have a single picture in a hat and graduation dress and she says she didn’t go to the graduation celebration because she thinks graduation celebrations are for children and the only reason she thinks its for children is because she couldn’t go and I’am sure she did’nt have a graduate. I told her one every time to show me her degree and she asked me in a realy angry way, Why? You want to hire me? Because If she realy come out a degree, wouldn’t she show a degree papers to me, don’t you think? but my father loves her and always Sarah this and Sarah that thing and she is graduate from Barnard and shes the smart one and she is the joy of his heart and she is the apple of his eye and she is the flower of every four seasons. They can all go to hell on a quick basket.