My sister is upstairs making homemade macaroni and cheese, because she is an amateur chef and I am really...not. She made some last week with a variety of delicious cheeses that left me literally face down in my plate, and gave me something spiffy to bring to work for lunch for a change. She leaves tomorrow to go back to California after being home on the east coast for a few weeks for the holiday. We spent today shopping and having lunch with our mother, and even after lots of face time in this busy season, it'll be very hard to see her go tomorrow.

That's why I'm taking my wimpy self to work while my father does airport duty, because I hate to cry in public and blow this whole badass image I've got going on. Thank God there will be another dish of mac 'n cheese in my lunch bag to ease the pain.

I can't help it. I just don't, do not, cannot fake that I do, like this whole "my sister lives a few thousand miles away" thing, which truthfully surprises me. We're both active travelers, world citizens and all that, well at home on an airplane or the Eurail or a road trip or wherever else we happen to land. She spent a semester in Europe during undergrad and loved it, and has been all over the place before and since. So when she decided last year that she would go to San Diego to go to graduate school, I was all about that plan. Live near the ocean? Go on with your bad self. I was the idiot water-lover who moved to landlocked Ohio when I left the DC-area. Be ye not so blinded by young, silly love.

Seriously, I've pretty much done whatever I've wanted to do in terms of geography so far (love Ohio, by the way! Just kidding! Go Dayton Flyers!), and I supported her doing the same. It's a big world, and who knows what little plot of it will fit, you know? But I didn't realize then, because I'm apparently quite slow, that California and Maryland are several thousand miles apart, which can present a significant barrier to hanging out on a regular basis. Duh.

So when I picked her up at the airport in mid-December, it was a happy thing. Everything felt sort of solid with the world again, lending credence to the claim that I'm an impossible family sort, a pushy loved-ones gatherer, who takes too many pictures and cries at the drop of a hat - not quite the island or the rock of one very depressing popular song.

We are an unusual pair, I guess. We are the only two children my parents had, and I'm a full ten years and a few months older. This means that not only did they clearly have to wait a decade to drum up the nerve to try again, but that I occasionally did carpool duty and gave her movie money and took her to her first concert (Debbie - now Deborah - Gibson, thanks.) I did expose her to some cooler-than-average music for a middle schooler, just to make up for this, along with all the hair metal. This decade disparity also means that over the years I've sometimes seemed either hopelessly out of touch or a complete bossy lunatic, even when I'm just trying to HELP. Who said wisdom came easy?

Age differences like this also tend to mess with birth order psychology just a bit. By the time I was 10 years old, I was a comfortably ensconced only child, and being knocked off of that particular cloud hits a little harder the closer to the age of reason you get. I wasn't exactly prepared to share the stage by then, and the maternal role probably made more sense when I think about it now - coping mechanism and all that, plus a natural reaction to having a baby underfoot. It's a little hard, and ridiculous at that, to engage in sibling rivalry with a being who can't feed herself yet. Over the years the relationship has evolved, as she's grown up and asserted herself in different ways, and that motherly role - already filled by the one we share- didn't need another applicant.

Toni Morrison said, "A sister can be seen as someone who is both ourselves and very much not ourselves - a special kind of double," and I agree with this, at least in our case. We are different in some distinct ways in which we approach our daily lives. There are things she's interested in that I don't really get and vice versa, and yet in terms of values and in several vantage points of our world view, we are quite similar. We're both media savvy, socially aware and active, love the ocean and a great meal and an even better glass of wine. We care about music and books. We've both been and will likely always be educators.

Still, she's a better chef and I'm more of a geek. My heart is right there on my sleeve - see it? SEE IT BLEEDING? - whereas she's more reserved. She's a women's studies major who wants to work in advocacy and get her Ph.d., whereas I'm more into the words and pictures side of storytelling at this point and can't see past j-school yet. She's got a serious boyfriend most of the time and I'm (way) more of a singleton. Differences, yes.

But still, when I needed to move home from Ohio because my wells there had run dry and all I wanted was a fresh start in some old territory, she brought herself and her friend out there to help me pack the truck and drive the car back. And when I got the damned thing stuck in a Wendy's drive-through somewhere near Wheeling, West Virginia, she stood behind it and directed me out, while it "BEEPBEEPBEEPED" to indicate that a very silly woman was putting a large vehicle in reverse. When she hit a major roadblock just before high school graduation, I sat on her bed and handed her tissues. We lay on the same stretch of beach for one week every summer and laugh at the same stupid family jokes. We both crack up at What About Bob and The Breakfast Club, and can quote much of the dialogue from Say Anything back and forth. I would tell her a secret, because she knows how to keep it. I would tell her the truth, and I do, because she appreciates it even if it doesn't make her happy. There are things I would protect her from, still, because I'd want to, because I wouldn't know how not to, because that's just the way it goes.

And until she comes home, or until I visit a place I'm told I'll love when I see it, I'll miss her. Because I didn't end up an only child. Lucky me.

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Sisters are doing it - yeah, ya heard - for themselves, for each other, and for you, dear readers, all around the land of blogs. My own mentioned to me this fall that she'd - a dedicated foodie, as noted above, who can cook up a storm and watches much Food Network - like to start a food blog. I think this would be a cool way to keep in touch, so I think I'll reignite the idea.

Right here at Camp BlogHer we have a blogging sister team or two. Kristen just shared that she is going to be part of a baby swag event at the Golden Globes with sisters Jen Lemen and Patience Salgado. (Check out their Soul Sister Designs Etsy store here.) Kristen says the experience will be ably Twittered.

And BlogHer co-founder Lisa Stone recently linked to her sister Anna's blog, saying she sends her New Year's "Matrix" list to her in New York for a little tough love.

Once I've written up the list, I take the most important step: I ship it off to my sister Anna and ask her to take out her sparkly red pen and kick the list's ass. Seriously. Because I need an editor for my life. I need someone I love, who knows what I'm good at and knows what I'm bad at to take a sharp-eyed look at what kind of year I'm setting myself up for. That service doesn't end on New Year's Day either: This list comes with a fairy godsister who's going to poke me with her wand if I let myself down badly and encourage me when I need her to, if I ask her for help. And I need help hitting my goals.

I asked my own sister to take a peek at mine, but she looked a little scared. I might tuck it into her carry-on bag.

About to be added to our BlogHer blog lists (if they're not there already) are some other blogging sisters. They're a cosmopolitan bunch, as it happens, who use blogs to keep in touch, to churn out good recipes, or to motivate each other - and readers - to have a healthier body and mind.

The Scattered Sisters say:

We are three sisters strewn across the globe. One lives in Prague, one lives in Antwerp and one lives in San Francisco. A puppeteer, a painter and a photographer. Sometimes we do something else for a living.

Rosalie Quinlan and Melanie Hurlston write a design blog called Melly and Me together in Australia. The fabric they showcase on the site is so pretty, if I only knew what to do with it! I'm sure some of you out there can work wonders with it. I . really enjoyed their photos of a recent trip to Holland. (And seriously, if you're a sewer/crafter of any sort, check it out.)

Katie and Molly at Sister Skinny are trying - together - to get to a size 6. Katie has one resolution this year - to vacuum the house once a week - but a list of other things she'll be getting to.

I do love this time of year though; it's got me thinking about my blogging addiction how much I love blogging, what a great tool this has been in my progress, and how many amazingly cool people I've met (and real life friends and family I've re-connected with). Yes, I am talking about you. Thanks for reading, thanks for your comments, thanks for the emails, thanks for being people who get it. And If you're just starting out with a plan to exercise and eat well this year, hang out with us. We're funner. Yes, funner.

Anne and Laura are The Cookin' Sisters of Cookin' Sisters & Friends at Barefoot in the Kitchen. Cool site! I'm headed back there for some tips, for sure.

Cate at Serendipity is another blogger from Australia "keeping up with friends and family all over the world." This includes her three sisters, who also blog. "Is this some kind of record," she wonders?

Probably not, but unusual in Australia at least to have four sisters blogging. We are far-flung, so it is a great way to keep up. Somehow, time for a chatty phone call rarely seems to happen, and you can't CC a phone call! Australia is only just beginning to adapt to social media - certainly the younger "digital natives" are embracing it, but amongst older people it is a matter of "what's a blog??". A straw poll in my staffroom last week found nobody knew about blogging, nobody had a Myspace page and nobody listened to podcasts, let alone made them. Teachers run the risk of being left behind by their students.........so Hooray for the Blogger Sisters!!!

Laurie White writes at LaurieWrites