Copycat!

Growing up, one of the worst offenses in the Ceman household was copying a sibling. The punishment for copycatting in the first degree? Wrath, and a lot of it. The worst kind of copying involved food. Say, for example, I fixed myself an after-school snack of potato chips with French onion dip. If Mike thought that looked pretty tasty and made himself the same, I would immediately become filled with intense petty rage. "You're a copycat!" I would hurl at him with a level of scorn and vitriol that a typical, non-10-year-old person normally would reserve for, say, perpetrators of genocide.

Twenty-some years later, I hear that same level of contempt in Ben's voice when Paul copies him. Last night, I asked Ben and Paul if they wanted a hot dog or hamburger for supper. Paul: "What are you going to have, Ben?" Ben: "A hot dog." Paul: "I'll have a hot dog." Ben: "You're copying me! Next time I'm going to lie so you can't have what I'm having!" It's funny to observe this as an adult. Though I would no longer feel that stab of irritation if one of my brothers saw me eat my ice cream and decided they would like to put chocolate chips on top of theirs too, I somehow can recall the intensity of annoyance it caused back then. So, yeah, I can sympathize with Ben a little bit. More than anything, though, I can see the situation for what it really is. In Paul's eyes, Ben is the alpha and the omega of cool. Of course, I don't expect Ben to understand that, not for many years. For now, imitation is the sincerest form of annoyance.