The Creativity of Sibling Assignments

By Carol Woolum Roberts

Yesterday, Facebook posts started popping up as Sibling Day was being celebrated on my News Feed.  It was fun to see people post photos of them and their siblings.

I reflected a bit on my siblings, and how fortunate I am to have them in my life, living in the same community, and seeing them regularly. Our weekly family dinners make sure that happens.

For a period of time between about 2007 – 2018 my brother Bill and my sister Christy would give each other assignments to write about, or sometimes take photos.  Many had to do with our memories growing up together in Kellogg, and how we each saw those memories through different lenses.

In the spirit of Sibling Day, I am going to share with you one of the sibling assignments we did, and links to read them on my sibling’s blogs, as well as my own previous blog. 

My result from this particular assignment was a poem.  And since it is also National Poetry Month, I thought I could also share one of my poems as well.

Here is the assignment:

This week's Sibling Assignment was given to us by Raymond Pert. Here is his assignment:

Take a picture of something weird or of something not weird in a weird way. Try to make the subject of your picture either unrecognizable or take a picture of something really odd that your viewer won't know what it is.

Post the picture and write a post about it in whatever way you want. You might try to identify what's in the picture or you might write what the picture makes you feel or think about or whatever.

Here is Raymond Pert's post on the picture I sent him, and here is Inland Empire Girl's post on the picture RP sent her. Below is my post based on the photo IEG sent me.

(At this time, bloggers did not use their real names.  Bill was Raymond Pert, Christy was Inland Empire Girl, and I was Silver Valley Girl.)

These windows remind me of the garage doors down the street from our old house on McKinley Avenue in Kellogg, located behind the old Bunker Hill office building. This is what I imagine these “eyes” saw over the years as they gazed upon my hometown.

Keeping My Eyes on Kellogg

Hard hat, silver lunch pail, Thermos.
Booted feet shuffling by on the way to the dry.
Cigarette snuffed out on the pavement.
Raised hands in greeting.
Keeping my eyes on Kellogg.

Brown hills, scrubby brush, rust-colored soil.
Smoky haze lingering on top of mountain peak.
Hills aglow with fiery lava.
New formations created each night.
Keeping my eyes on Kellogg.

Lead, arsenic, cadmium.
Milky white creek runs through center of town.
No one dares explore the banks.
Full of poisons from years gone by.
Keeping my eyes on Kellogg.

Neon signs, swinging doors, music blaring.
No parking places uptown on a Friday night.
Payday and everyone’s pockets are full.
Raising glasses and swinging fists.
Keeping my eyes on Kellogg.

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Have you ever sat around and shared stories with your siblings, and your different views of memories from childhood?  Have you ever wrote those stories down?  We encourage you to write them down so future generations can read them.

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Because of National Sibling Day and National Poetry Month, Carol shares a past Sibling Assignment her and her siblings wrote.