On Scrambled Eggs and Sibling Relationships

I live in New York, so I go home relatively often — usually at least once a month over the course of the semester. And every time I do, I know I’ll be performing a specific activity. Every Sunday morning that I’m home, without fail, my nine-year-old sister bounds over and asks me to make her scrambled eggs.

I always oblige, of course. And this isn’t just because she’s too cute to resist, although having a toothless nine-year-old tell you sweetly that you make the best eggs ever doesn’t hurt. Rather, every time I whisk a couple of eggs together, adding salt, pepper and the secret ingredient (garlic powder) and cooking them slowly on the burner until they come together, I think about our relationship.

Every college student with younger siblings knows the struggle of trying to keep in touch as lifelong roommates suddenly become estranged for the academic year. Amid the bustle of Harvard’s culture of never-ending problem sets, back-to-back lectures, and late-night club meetings, staying up to date on happenings at home hundreds of miles away can seem like a nearly impossible task.

It’s hard enough to stay up to date with my two teenage siblings who have social and academic lives of their own. But at least teenagers, regardless of their flaws, usually have phones, not to mention social skills, making it easier than ever to bridge the gap. A quick text, a silly meme, or a brief video call can effortlessly transcend the physical distance and time constraints that Harvard life imposes.

For those of us with very young siblings, however, the challenge multiplies. I am very close with my littlest siblings, and spend lots of time with them at home, going on day trips, playing games, and watching movies with them. But those things just don’t translate well virtually. My youngest sister, though she has an iPad with iMessage enabled, simply doesn’t know how to maintain an online conversation, not due to any fault of her own. Her idea of texting involves spamming me with several unicorn pictures and all of the different-colored hearts in the emoji library, and then proceeding to not send me anything else for days on end.

Calls don’t tend to go any better. When we FaceTime and I attempt to strike up a conversation, it usually only lasts for a couple of minutes. I ask about school and what happened that weekend, and she then proceeds to lose interest in what essentially becomes an interrogative interview. There are always more exciting things going on in person than speaking with your sister who is several hundred miles away on a small screen.

Of course, this is frustrating to me, and anyone else who feels like they essentially lose their youngest siblings for a couple of months when they leave for the semester. In the tapestry of college life, the significance of sibling relationships cannot be overstated. Siblings often stand as understated yet crucial pillars of support, offering a unique blend of shared history, unconditional love, and a reality check that only a familial bond can provide.

Young siblings can also be utterly hilarious in a way only children can. My sister, for example, has a maniacal yet adorable laugh that can make everyone around her crack up too. Sometimes, in the thick of midterms, I just want to hear those peals of laughter, and knowing that likely I won’t until I go home again can be a bit depressing. There’s no good way to navigate relationships that just can’t reach their fullest potential until you spend time together in person, and that can sometimes lead me to fear that her childhood is passing me by while I am out of the house.

When we are together, though, things slip into normalcy. Upon my return, my sister always greets me with a huge hug, but I don’t think that’s her truest expression of missing me. My nine-year-old sibling is almost absurdly picky, and would subsist on bread, chicken nuggets, hot dogs, and macaroni and cheese if she could, yet she loves when I cook for her. Maybe my eggs aren’t the best in the world, but they are a food that she loves — a show of nonverbal affection on her part. And every time I spray the small frying pan with oil and prepare to pour in the scramble, I silently think about how much I love her too.

This ritual keeps me grounded and reminds me that no matter how far apart we are or for how long, my sister and I will always share a bond. I definitely haven’t mastered the delicate balance of long-distance sibling relationships, but I highly recommend to everyone reading this: Develop your own in-person custom with your siblings. It might not involve cooking, but I can attest that the right, simple action can rebuild connections in an instant. Find your scrambled eggs, and savor the garlic-flavored moments that keep your sibling relationships alive, even from afar.

Leah R. Baron ’25, a Crimson Editorial editor, is a Statistics concentrator in Lowell House.