Mirror Mirror

By Maida Chan Artwork by Gavin Otteson

Growing up, people seemed to be fascinated by me and my sister. I can’t count the number of times that people have asked us, “What’s it like being a twin?” For my part, I never quite knew how to answer that question. While we do have an older sister, she is about 7 years older than we are. When you’re a kid, 7 years is a lot.

I typically respond to that question with another question, “What is it like not being a twin?” Tis ultimately elicits more specifc questions that are really about the mythology of identical twins being the same person, psychically linked:

“If she falls down in the other room, can you spontaneously feel her pain and know something is wrong?”

“Do you know what each other is thinking without speaking?”

And the silliest of them all–

“When you see her, do you sometimes mistake her for being a mirror?”

I can safely say that I never mistook my sister for being my refection. We are mirror twins–I’m left- handed, she’s right- handed and, eerily enough, my vision in my left eye is the about the same as her right eye and vice versa–but never have my sister nor I stared at each other across the room at the same exact time and thought we were looking at a mirror. Nor have we felt each other’s pain and known each other’s thoughts psychically. Because we were around each other 24/7, we most likely knew each other’s pain and thoughts empathetically, sort of the same way couples and best friends do. One time, when I was 3 or 4, my parents had separated us into two diferent rooms since they suspected my sister was running a temperature. My dad was with my sister, while my mom was with me. I could hear him struggling to get her to take the thermometer and could feel their frustration and anxiety permeate through the walls. I started crying which caused my mom some concern and confusion. It wasn’t that I was sick; I merely felt bad for my sister. In other instances, whenever one of us was upset and crying, our parents would rely on us to be the translator for the other. It wasn’t that we could magically read each other’s thoughts. We simply understood what the other was saying through the garbled heaves and tears from spending so much time together.

Another assumption people make about twins is that we are each other’s best friends. If we are the “same” person, have the same interests, and are “psychically” connected, we should be even more strongly bonded to each other, right?

In my case, that isn’t so.

We fought over things the way siblings do, like who gets to use the bathroom frst, and were quite competitive with each other when it came to anything related to academic performance. We had an intense sibling rivalry, which was only fueled even more by the Asian Tiger culture we grew up in. But another shift started to emerge in our teen years. She stopped talking to some of our shared childhood friends. I didn’t completely understand it at the time. To some extent, I knew my sister felt like we were competing for our friends’ attention, but always assumed that those feelings were momentary. We all grew up together in the same classes and extracurricular activities and would hang out with each other. I found out many years later that my sister didn’t like the fact that we shared friends. She wanted her own friend group, and had pretty much forced them to pick between being friends with either her or me.

I was dumbstruck by this revelation. For years, I had believed that our sibling rivalry was part of the reason we didn’t get along. It’s hard to be friends with someone who you see as your competition, but I fgured that as young adults we would grow out of it. I continually prayed for God to heal our relationship and would do my best to be a good, thoughtful sister. Another turning point came 10 years ago when my older sister invited us to spend the holidays with her and her husband when our parents went on a months-long cruise. I remember thinking how much fun it would be for us to go to Seattle together. It would be the frst time we, the twins, would travel together. We could spend time doing touristy things and hang out with my neph-dog.

My twin sister did not share the same enthusiasm. Whenever I would bring up planning the trip, she would change the subject or comment about how she wasn’t sure of her plans yet. Eventually, I confronted her on why she was avoiding fnalizing our fight and she fnally admitted her concerns–she was worried we would not get along and fght the entire time. Without our parents to referee, she felt that we would get stuck in our old behaviors dictated by our stubbornness and sibling rivalry. While I assured her that I didn’t want to fght her and wanted us to hang out and be friends, she held frm to her beliefs. I ended up fying to Seattle by myself while she stayed in LA with her friends.

Once there, I shared my confusion and disappointment with my older sister. I couldn’t understand why things between my twin and I were so complicated. Her assessment was that while I may have enjoyed being a twin, my sister hated being one and felt that it took away from her individuality. We went to twin therapy for a couple of years after this trip, but nothing seemed to be getting better. At one point, I heard her tell a colleague of hers that she didn’t like being my twin as I reminded her of all of her worst qualities.

Tings started to improve during lockdown though. Because we were in each other’s Covid bubble, we ended up hanging out more often and watched movies, shows, and got dinner together on Friday nights. When things started opening up again, we continued to make an efort to see each other.

For our birthday this year, I suggested we do a trip to Western Europe since none of us had ever been. While my twin thought it was too much work to plan such a big trip, I assured her that we had enough time to plan ahead. A few days later, I got a call from our mutual friend stating she felt it was best to call of the trip. My sister had called her earlier and told her she felt we, the twins, would most likely fght with each other on the trip and that our friend would be put in the middle and forced to pick who she would side with. Tis friend, who had made the efort to stay friends with both of us even though my sister asked her to pick many years ago, was not about to pick.

I was livid. I thought we had fnally reached a place where we could openly talk through our issues and not involve other people. I apologized to our friend for the position she was in. She assured me that I was not the one with the issue, but I, nonetheless, felt hurt and disappointed. It saddened me to feel like we went back 10 years in time in spite of therapy and the growth that occurred during the past few years.

I’ve come to realize that the twinship and friendship I so long for may never happen. Try as hard as I can to be a good sister and work towards us having a better relationship, my sister just isn’t in the same place as I am and may never be. I truly believe that God desires for us to be friends and not just relatives, for his is a heart of reconciliation, but it will be through the work he does in both of us. I’ve been held captive for too long in trying to be the fxer and must release it to him for my mental health and well-being.

Releasing this hasn’t been easy. Being an identical twin is woven so deeply into my identity and it’s been one of the things that makes me feel unique. However, I believe releasing this part of my identity to God doesn’t simply mean letting it go. I believe that God wants to add more to my identity and show me other ways that I’ve been fearfully and wonderfully made. I will always be a twin, but I am more than just my relationship with my sister. Releasing my ideal of a twinship can only allow space for other relationships and friendships to take space and grow. And that grants me an acceptance and peace I’ve never had before.

Te scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written:

“Te Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.”

He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently. Ten he began to speak to them. “Te Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulflled this very day!”

It doesn’t take long to see the imbalance of the natural world in our southern California home. Te landscape is marked with asphalt roads lined with non-native trees, and turf-grass lawns trying to look like the European manor houses of old, and our water sources sprawl through multiple states. Te metropolis of Los Angeles was built on the exploitation of the richness of the land, frst with the beef production of the Spanish and Mexican Ranchos, the oil boom and orange groves of Anglo-American settlers, and now with the Real Estate boom of the past half-century, we’ve divided up and paved most of the Los Angeles Basin. Tis has come at the cost of so much of the natural beauty that drew so many settlers here and has left countless captives in the name of endless growth. What does the Christian response to this state of afairs look like? If Jesus came to set the captives

Te Los Angeles Basin has long been dotted by rivers that have nourished the landscape since Time Immemorial. Te Los Angeles River, the Santa Ana River, and–the closest to our region as Evergreeners–the San Gabriel River, all had thriving Tongva villages, ancient oak groves, and nourishment to countless species of animals and plants. From its source in the mountains to its end in what is now Long Beach, the river ebbed and fowed for millennia, and would have been dotted with trout, grizzlies, and the bustle of Tongva villages like Sevaanga (near San Gabriel), Asuuskshanga (where the name Azusa derives from), and down to the sacred site of Povuu’nga (on CSULB campus). However, after fooding in the early 1900s (exacerbated by gold and gravel mining which left the river more shallow), much of Southern California was underwater. Instead of restoring natural food prevention (wetlands and green belts), the settler leadership of the region decided to channelize and take the river captive. She still brings water to the region, but no trout swim in her waters, no Mountain Lions drink at her shore, and she gets scofed at by residents and visitors. Villages still operate near the rivers, but now they are populated by our region’s unhoused residents, who have been forgotten in the race for growth and proft.

In Lodi, the town in the central valley where I grew up, the Mokelumne River fowed through the northern part of town. While similar issues with the river exist, like dams that block fsh migration and pollution along the shore, the river still fows naturally. So many of my childhood memories were made while kayaking, fshing, and walking by the river. The oak and cottonwood trees gave shade, and blackberry bushes were a fun snack, especially when they weren’t ripe and were so very sour. Te river wasn’t and isn’t in a fully pristine state surely, but it was living and gave so much to us: joy, wonder, and life.

Jesus calls us to action and to follow him, and often that takes a radical imagination to dream of a more just, beautiful and balanced world. What if we see the nature of the Los Angeles basin as our neighbor to be loved and respected as such? Rivers will always be adapted for human use, but we can have food prevention without making our rivers lifeless. Meaningful change can look as simple as planting sage instead of turf grass or taking the train instead of driving, or it can be as spectacularly complex as building a wildlife crossing overpass (like the one opening soon in Grifth Park) or releasing our once proud rivers.