I learned recently that Peter Cole, editor of Keyhole, is the oldest of four boys! I find this fascinating! It makes total sense, doesn’t it?
So tell me, do you have siblings? If so, how many? Where do you fit in that roundup? (I, alas, am an only. It is, yes, lonely. Sometimes.)
I’m the oldest of five. Two brothers, two sisters. I’m ten years older than the youngest two, boy/girl twins.
Matt! The oldest of five! Twins! I love it!
I bet the holidays are nice, feel full. Think how many kids there’ll be in like 20 years at your family gatherings!
Matt, do you think you fit the “eldest sibling” birth order personality?
I’m the oldest of two (my brother is three years younger) though if you include the assorted step-siblings, I’m right in the middle. And if by ‘eldest sibling personality’ you mean wise and dashingly handsome, I think I fit that perfectly.
(just joking)
What’s the “eldest sibling” personality supposed to be like? Personally, I like nikkorpon’s definition…
http://www.google.com/search?q=birth+order+personality&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a
I don’t believe this is very scientific stuff, but fun, maybe, nonetheless . . .
I’m the youngest of 2, with the addition of a 3rd when I was 7. Chad is my bio bro, 2 years older, and Scott is my step, 7 years older.
I got one brother. Though, I walways wondered what it would be like to grow up in a family of like, eight kids. Would the familial drama and tension be dispersed or intensified?
My brother and I used to fight a ton (hit him with a pool cue, swing a barbell at him. All it one bout) but we get along okay now. I always wondered if a big family meant you had the feeling of having a big crew to support you. Or did it mean that you often disappeared into the background if you weren’t the oldest or the youngest?
our family is pretty big/wide-spread, but i would say the drama is way intensified. i often tell people we’re a close-knit group of people who hate each other. i think each of my siblings and i have in turn made one of us bleed. from knife-wounds to severe bites.
I’m the youngest of 3, by 8 years. My older brother and sister are just over a year apart. At times, I felt like an only child growing up. But then there were these satellite beings who traipsed in and out and gave me mix tapes and introduced me to the Smiths and certain curse words, etc. There was more than a little hero worship, from me to them. Now that we’re all grownups, the gap has diminished considerably…
I’m an only child myself…
This is so interesting! Am I the only one who’s interested? More more more!
im the oldest of three, one brother one sister. my brother is only a year and a half younger though so the older we get the more we are sort of the same age. i think we were too close in age for me to feel any sense of being like the oldest, or like imparting wisdom onto him. he was always more social than me, was much more popular, and i looked up to him a lot more than he me i think. my parents adopted my sister when i was twelve, she was two, so thats ten years between us. i wasnt around for a lot of her childhood, i left for the army at 18 and she was only 8.
i have the aggressive traits of that first-born personality thing.
You were in the army?
yep
actually, not all of the aggressive traits. my brother is much more assertive than i am. i can play the leader role and excel at it but i usually prefer not to.
loud and clear, bartleby
I have one sister who’s 4 years older. We fought like cats and dogs when we were little (I think she still has a bite mark in her back from me), but now we’re very close despite living in different cities and being just about polar opposites of each other.
I think I’m a little wilder than my sister because I came second – things that my sister had to wait to do (piercings, late curfews, etc.) I often got to do earlier because my parents saw that my sister didn’t die from those things. I think I took more liberties than she did, tested limits, maybe because of trust she laid the groundwork for.
I think this stuff is fascinating, too, and love that so many people responded so quickly. I think it reflects an undeniable curiosity about human nature, probably something that fuels all of our writing at least a little, right? Also, self-obsession/ figuring out where we fit into the grand scheme.
I have one sister. She’s three years older than me. 2 nieces & a nephew.
I’m the oldest of four. Two brothers and a sister. My youngest brother is 10 years younger than me.
i have four sisters and two brothers. i was the youngest of the original franchise of four, but then our parents divorced, re-married, and bred some more. the break down is:
37- sister
35- brother
29- sister
26- ME!
19- half-brother (from mother)
18- half-sister (from dad)
14- half-sister (from dad)
middle child of seven – interesting to me the way our behavior during adult first impressions (meeting people at work, at parties, at school, etc.) might mirror the behavior we learned as children, when familial interactions were our most common interactions.
I’m the oldest of three and the only girl. We fought a lot as kids but were also very close and remain so as adults. Until a couple months ago, my baby brother had lived with me for the past five years. I’m 35, the middle child is 32 and the baby (who is still referred to as the baby) is 27.
one biological sis (my best friend. younger), a step bro and step sis (both younger) one older sister in japan i’ve never met, two surrogate older sisters who “show me how to be cool,” a cousin who is sort of like an older brother. that makes nine i guess. eight? i dont get math