Lies That Chelsea Handler Told Me - Chelsea's Family, Friends [54]
—Chelsea
This is Josh with my sisters. Everyone has a crush on Josh except for me—because we almost went down that road ten years ago until both of us made sharp turns in opposite directions.
Chapter Eight
Sisterly Love
SHOSHONNA HANDLER
Chelsea and me on our front lawn in New Jersey. This was before our relationship went south.
My name is Shoshonna and I am Chelsea’s older sister. My parents told me that before Chelsea was born I was a cute, good-natured, happy-go-lucky kid. Then came 1975 and my blissful little five-year-old world was turned upside down. I had been the baby of our large and dysfunctional family for five years and had loved every minute of it. I didn’t know what to make of the new addition to our family, or why they would have named her Chelsea. Every time I heard her name, it reminded me of seafood stew. I cried all the time.
Chelsea had an all-consuming presence. It felt like being hit by a train. My father has told us all many times over that when she was born, she came out with such a strong cry that the nurse said to him, “You’d better watch out for this one.” Over the years, I became more quiet and pensive as Chelsea’s boisterous personality took center stage. She was full of piss and vinegar from day one, and could throw a tantrum that would put any toddler to shame. This kid was a force to be reckoned with, and my parents were already exhausted with their other five kids. They were in no way prepared to handle raising this particular child, and their feeble efforts were of little consequence. Besides, our mom was always napping, knitting, or cooking, and was too soft-spoken to really stand up to Chelsea.
By the time Chelsea was three, she had the street smarts of a nine-year-old, and I may as well have been born yesterday. We were complete opposites, like oil and water, and never agreed on anything. If I was watching a TV show she didn’t like, she would say something like “A package just came for you at the door, Shana,” or “Mom just took some brownies out of the oven,” and then take over the television. I fell for it every time. I would come back in the room and wage war in the form of a wrestling match. Ultimately I would be the one to get yelled at or sent to my room because I was “older” and “should know better.” We fought constantly and wanted to rip each other’s throats out for most of our childhood. Physically I had the upper hand, but verbally I was no match for her. By the time she was eight, she had the debating skills of a seasoned politician, and I am being completely serious.
For many years we shared a bedroom, and we agreed to place masking tape down the middle and not cross territories. This was pretty much a joke, unless we were both in the room. Raids occurred when the other person was not there. Chelsea would regularly steal my clothes when I was in high school. (Yes, it’s true, she’s five years younger, and we were clearly different sizes, but this did not deter her. She would just knot the shirts at the waist or cut them in half.) At one point I installed latches to hold a combination lock on my closet door. A week later I came home from school to find her wearing the brand-new clothes I had just purchased with my first paycheck from my new afterschool job at the mall. I went nuts and ran upstairs to find that she had taken a screwdriver to the latches. And because she was so angry I wouldn’t share with her, she decided to tie-dye all my underwear.
Years later, when Chelsea was about fifteen and I was twenty and home from college, it was with great joy that I picked up the phone and heard a police officer tell me that they had Chelsea down at the station for shoplifting underwear at Sears with a friend. Underwear has always been a big theme in our family. Not wearing any can and has resulted in humiliation, in the form of photographs, e-mails, and/or having you and your genitalia chased around