(1-97) When I was an angry and anxious teenager, one of my best friends taught me the word patience. She said that's the word her mother gave before she died. She said her mother said: "The word patience is composed of a dagger on top of a heart. It hurts, but you must endure."

Her mother was the first wife. She had three children, one boy and two girls. The second wife also lived in the same household, and she had a boy and a girl. My girl friend was the youngest of the three, and she happened to be the same age as the girl of the second wife. I have no idea why both girls ended up in the same class of the junior high school I went to. I didn't understand the significance then. All I knew was for some strange reason if you were a friend of one sister, then you could not be a friend of the other.

My girl friend is slightly older than her half sister. She has a mild temperament, and a slender elegant look. The half sister is very competitive; she belonged to the so called "good student" group. Naturally, I chose the elder sister over the younger one.

My girl friend seems to know and accept the fact that she is not the smart one. One of the things we remember most about her in high school was the article she wrote in the composition class that her wish is simply to get married have children, and then have grand children. We all laughed at her humble wish when most of us were dreaming to be a writer or a doctor.

We went our separate ways after junior high. The system is such that you have to go through an entrance examination to get into senior high then college. Being scholastically inferior, my girl friend fell behind. She didn't get to a good senior high school, and she didn't get into a regular four-year college program. She graduated from a three year business school and got married. Her half sister, on the other hand, went to a top university, and later went to America for a graduate degree.

When we had our reunion years later, we learned that the half sister could not adjust the life in America and came back home with a master degree. She worked in a research lab as an assistant and never got married. My girl friend, however, was a happy mother of a boy and a girl. We were still close. She told me she was tempted to have an affair with her boss, who was a branch manager from America. She chose to stay with her husband and family. I lamented for her lost chance of being happy, while she was content with her choice.

Her father married another younger woman. The second and the third wife were living in the same household. The second wife was not as tolerant as the first one. There were constant fights. My girl friend felt sorry for her half sister, who was still living with her mother. We joked about our fathers, and shrugged that there's nothing we could do but fulfill our duty as daughters. Her father was no longer rich and famous. The magazine he founded was closed. He was teaching part time in a university. His income was not enough for a household with two wives. My girl friend had to give him money regularly to help out.

Her father died a few years ago. I heard the news from another girl friend in the same class. She was gleeful and said it was on the newspaper that the two wives were fighting over the inheritance. I just listened. I never asked my girl friend how her father died.

The story of my girl friend's parents was over. It's like the book "A Dream in The Red Mansion" described: "a vast white earth, all cleaned." My girl friend immigrated to Toronto for her two children's education. Her half sister lives with her mother, still single.