For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for March 09, 2021

Surprised to know that your dear brother is typical?

A boy is a boy even if he is grown up.

I was so lucky that my brother and I got along, most of the time. Now that he’s gone, I have good memories to hold onto…

I’m an only child. The frustration or pleasure of having siblings is something I’ll never know. :/

My late biological mother was the youngest of two older sisters and three older brothers (in that order). She was always bullied by the third brother who was closest in age. I think my uncle mellowed down by the time my mother was diagnosed with (and later died from) cancer.

I think siblings will almost always have their battles, regardless of gender. My sister (three years older to the day) and I had some doozies growing up but she became much more reasonable after she moved away to college. ;-}

We lost her at 26 and almost four decades later, I’d give anything to see her again.

When I was 8 and my brother 6 my divorced parents split us up—me with my mother and my new step-dad (whom I loved from the beginning—no wicked stepfather for me), brother with my dad. There followed several years of me acting out negatively … no one had a clue why, least of all me. I later learned that separating siblings, especially if they’re young and close (as we were—he was my baby brother!) is more traumatic than separating kids from parents. So we missed all the sibling rivalry, but we missed growing up together … all things considered, I would have preferred the rivalry!

At least Elizabeth is talking to her siblings. Mine have gone their separate ways. And we haven’t talked for about a decade or so.

Off topic, this goes back a few days where Lynn Johnston stated she messed up by drawing a washing machine that can’t be identified as a washing machine in the drawing. In the first panel why does Liz have two soda pop glasses with straws in them and why is she putting them on a hard to reach top shelf? I figure to keep them away from the baby, but does she need two drinks? If one of them is from the lady in the wheelchair, she wouldn’t reach them either.

Typical asshat..

I was adopted when I was six, when a teenager found that I had a sister. After getting to know her, found that I was actually the baby of a family of five children and have ‘enjoyed’ knowing about being a part of a large family ! ! !

Is our duty as brothers.

While I must agree with Miss Edwards(not ms.?), anyway, I still find it a little sad that the “typical” brother is a jerk. Maybe it’s something people have to get out of their systems before they get old enough to go to jail for that sort of behavior.

The only perfect siblings were my kids, Masha and Salia!

Not typical at my house.

Another stereotype has been that all households must have both boys and girls. Part of this has to do with Hollywood and its sitcoms (with the exception of Leave it to Beaver, which had two sons). “Every boy needs a sister” has been a saying I have been told over and over again. However, there has been no proof that only children or those who had siblings of the same sex grow up at a disadvantage over those who had both brothers and sisters.

I have brothers. All of them are jerks. But then again, so am I.

And, Miss Goodie-Two-Shoes shows up again.

I have 2 of each. We get along much better now that we’re adults.

I’m fortunate. I have a brother and a sister. My poor sister, on the other hand, has only brothers for siblings.

At church, I sat behind a large family. They had several girls, but only one boy, the youngest. My father said, referring to the boy, “That poor kid.”

You are blessed, sweetie. Her bro is a vicious creep whose parents do not curb him.

Lynn packs in everything into one strip every day, just so it will end up in a punch line…and it’s a good one today. I doubt that in any family there are as many daily mishaps and misadventures as there are in the Patterson family…

No, actually. No he’s not.

Miss Edwards misspelled that last word, although she is a science teacher, not an English teacher, so that is understood. The proper spelling is S-T-E-R-E-O-T-Y-P-I-C-A-L

Of course it’s typical. How would Lizzie feel today if Anthony came home with a younger, cuter new wife that demanded all her time? That’s how Elly treated Mike once Lizzie was born, and it hasn’t stopped since.

It’s only going to get better with time….

“Boys will be boys”, eh Miss Edwards?

Hey, how about being a “typical teacher”? Teach Elizabeth her times tables, teach her why the world is round, teach her who killed whom in what battle and why. Leave family disputes to John and Elly. You don’t live in the Patterson residence.

Growing up was not always harmony, but I never had discord with my siblings to the extent that Michael and Elizabeth fight. For the “just a comic” crowd, there have been some of these strips where the Patterson kids have done something where I have remarked “Not even Calvin….on his worst day…did that!” :)

The only good kids in the strip are the Enjos. Dawn and Brian never fight. The Pattersons have as much chance of being a functional family as Miss Edwards has in winning a decathalon.

What is “typical”? I caught some guff when I called my grandmother a “typical white person”.

I was never that way with my brothers. Even so the 2nd oldest really became angry at me trying to do better than me or stopping me. I was forced to take care of my brothers as my mom worked nights. No father, he just quit.