My Sister Phoebe
Feb 12th, 2007 by Bethany
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I’m going to begin writing articles about people I like, and it appeals to my sense of order to begin with my sister Phoebe.
I am the oldest in my family, and Phoebe is next. She looks a lot like a cross between Anne Hathaway (from The Princess Diaries
When I was ten my mom taught both Phoebe and I piano lessons, and Phoebe was better than me. Now I understand that she had to be better than me since she earns her living with the piano and I never loved it like she did. That same year we took gymnastics (we did a lot of things together) and she learned to do a back handspring faster than me. That same year we both auditioned for a play: she got the part of the main character, I got to be a chorus girl. I’m not telling you this because I’m bitter, because I’m not. It was kind of hard on me then, but now I like to think of it as evidence that Phoebe is amazing, since I’m pretty amazing myself and she can out-do me in a lot of things.
When Phoebe plays the piano now, she really gets into it. It looks like she doesn’t know the rest of the world is there. Her mouth opens a little bit and she sways along with the music she creates. She leans forwards at the hard parts and looks at either the keys or the sheet music like they’re not going to get the best of her.
She teaches piano in Texas to both kids and adults. Her youngest students are three years old, although she was even starting to help my Degen along a bit at Thanksgiving (he was 20 months old at the time). She tries really hard to help them to learn to love the piano and music, which I think is eaven more important than learning to play the piano.
Phoebe is without guile, to the point of not getting about three quarters of the jokes she hears until everyone else is done laughing. That doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have a sense of humor–she laughs harder than anyone else did once she finally gets the joke. She is sensitive to others’ feelings, but not overly sensitive to the point of being annoying or weak.
Ballet is something Phoebe has always loved, though she never took a ballet class until college. Now she’s taking a ballet class at her local college just for fun–but she’s already in the second level class. Pheobe is good at Math–she won an award for it in school once and I’ve always admired her ability to understand numbers. Maybe it’s the Mozart in her.
Phoebe speaks German and spent a year in Germany improving her language skills. She also speaks English fluently (I hear it’s a hard language to learn)! She speaks a few words of Hebrew and quite a few more of French and I’ll bet she knows a couple in Spanish, too.
Phoebe is spiritual. She was always dilligent about reading her scriptures and saying her prayers. She hears God in the music she listens to and plays. She is grateful for her blessings. I love to hear her testimony in our conversations, though it’s never overt. It’s in her quiet trust that God will take care of her and of everyone else.
I couldn’t ask for a better friend than Phoebe. She’s loyal and caring. She thinks of nice things to do for her friends and does them. She works hard on her relationships. Phoebe defends her friends, even to herself when they’ve hurt her. She thinks the best of people.
Love ya Pheebs!
