Sarah Warren and Matt Warren

[00:02] SARAH WARREN: My name is Sarah Warren. I am 38 years old. Today's date is January 24, 2024. We're in Memphis, Tennessee, and I am interviewing Matthew Warren. Matt is my younger brother.

[00:18] MATTHEW WARREN: Yep. My name is Matthew Warren. Y'all can call me Matt. My age is 34. Today's date is January 24, 2024. We are in Memphis, Tennessee. My interview partner is Sarah Warren, and she is my sister. I am her little brother.

[00:38] SARAH WARREN: Okay, so what I would like to talk with you about today, Matt, is the relationship between siblings. So I have a son, Valentine. We call him Val. He is about three years and three months old. And next week, you will have a little brother. And what's special about this little brother, who doesn't quite have a name yet, is the age difference between Val and this younger brother will be almost exactly the age difference between you and me, down to a couple of weeks. And so today I would like to talk to you a little bit about sibling relationships.

[01:15] MATTHEW WARREN: Okay.

[01:15] SARAH WARREN: Okay. I want to start with saying probably my earliest memory in life is I remember mom being pregnant with you, and I get the question all the time, oh, do you think Val understands he's getting a baby brother? Do you think he knows you're pregnant? And I say, yes, I know he does, because I remember my mom being pregnant with my brother, and I remember being so excited. My clearest memory, first memory, was when I met you at the hospital when I was born, that we were staying at. We have an older brother, Andrew. Andrew and I were staying at grandma and grandpa's house, and they said, okay, it's time to go meet your brother. And I didn't like what mom had packed for me, so I insisted we went back to our house. I insisted we went to my closet, and I found it was the nicest dress I had. It was this red dress with white lace over it. And I just insisted on wearing the nicest thing I owned, to meet my baby brother at the hospital, because I wanted to make such a good impression. And really, that's my first memory in life. And so my question for you, my first question is, what is your first memory of me?

[02:27] MATTHEW WARREN: So it's a little hard to chronologically order memories from childhood, but given when the Lion King came out, I remember you and I choreographing different lion King songs and demanding our parents watch. And we'd always put on these stage productions of us singing those songs. Just can't wait to be king. Like, all those alternating parts, having, like, the stuffed animals out. It was everything. So I think, think that would be the first thing I remember distinctly of you and me. Yeah.

[03:10] SARAH WARREN: Okay. Do you have a favorite memory of us from childhood?

[03:16] MATTHEW WARREN: So I had a little time to read over and prepare these on probably about an hour. And I thought of a few, and I think this will be funny because it's still true to this day. They're, like, all music oriented. So I remember one of our first learned whistle. Super proud of it. And you took a tape recorder and we made an album of me whistling different songs.

[03:49] SARAH WARREN: You're gonna get rich. I was your producer.

[03:51] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Whenever. By the time I was in high school, you were taking me to concerts, going to, like, taking back Sunday, Sister Hazelden. That'll age us for this. It's really sweet. And learning songs together. And you'd always correct me on the lyrics or the timing and all that, and I would just get the rhythm, get better. And now growing up in West Memphis, so, like, now I sing along to all the hip hop songs now.

[04:19] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[04:19] MATTHEW WARREN: And I can do it.

[04:21] SARAH WARREN: It's funny. That's something I do with Val now. He loves to sing and he loves. But he went to help with the words because he's three and he can't get them right yet. So that's been fun.

[04:31] MATTHEW WARREN: And you even got a little karaoke machine. Yeah, he does really everything that we would have wanted as kids.

[04:38] SARAH WARREN: You're right. That's really funny. Okay, so I'm gonna go to. I'm gonna skip a question. I know I sent these ahead of time. In what ways do you think we were alike as children, or are we alike now?

[04:57] MATTHEW WARREN: So I think we resulted in a lot of shared values. And I think often what's kept us close over the years is we value and prioritize certain things. A lot of times we go to places. Whenever we hang out with the rest of our family, it feels like we're doing anything but talking to each other. We are putting on a sitcom to watch. Our parents always leave the television on, finding games, stuff like that. Whenever we hang out. And I feel like this happened whenever we're young, we'll just sit there, and the first thing we do for at least an hour is just talk, catch up. And it's kind of that sharing of ideas and always learning and listening and communicating that things kept us close. And even as we've been different, we've always sought to understand and talk and learn.

[05:59] SARAH WARREN: Yeah, I would say that's true. Like a shared curiosity of the world.

[06:07] MATTHEW WARREN: We inherited our father and grandfather's sense of humor. Yes, we did. Our response to anything is to chuckle first. So I think where, if I were to start, like, where we're, like, I think I would start with those things.

[06:25] SARAH WARREN: That's interesting that you said that about our responses to laugh at things. So our grandfather died last week, and I've been really sad at the house, and even though Val is three, he's never really seen me sad before. His response is to try to make me laugh. That's really funny, because you're right. You and I have that in common, and we got it from our father and our grandfather, even. And I call my funny Valentine. And it's really interesting to see those traits. Not just my traits, but your traits and dad's traits and grandpa's traits that are showing up and him. Okay, so if those are ways you think we are alike, in what ways do you think we're different?

[07:14] MATTHEW WARREN: I think the main point where I identify where we're different is you're considerably more driven. You always have the next step. You always have the thing to prove where I don't really have it that way, and I don't think one's right or one's wrong, but I think, like, growing up and this is cheating because the question is a little out of order, but growing up, whenever you're the youngest, and maybe it's because growing up in West Memphis, Arkansas, there's only, like, so many things that are available to do. But whenever I think about the things I did, I did band because my siblings did band. I did theater for a little while. Because you were into theater. I did boy scouts. My brother, my father did boy scouts, and I was perpetually doing the course that was laid out in front of me. Part of that is because third child parents had to figure it out by that point. Kid does these things. He needs to be entertained. He needs to be challenged. Here's the things. But it wasn't until I was out of the house that I was responsible for finding my own form of entertainment and finding my own challenges and things that I wanted to do. And. And I do eventually learn those things, but consequently, I'm a lot more willing to just kind of let it ride. Where you. You're in academia, you're working on tenure, you're writing a paper. Those are all ideas of fun to you, where I'm just content just talking about the ideas and just being happy with that.

[09:08] SARAH WARREN: Yeah, okay. I would agree with all that. Well, that you're right. That does address another question I had, which is, what's your take on birth order? So you are the baby, I am the middle child. So you're right. Feeling like you have something to prove. What's your take on all of that? Do you believe in birth order? Do you think your life would have been different if you were somewhere different in the order?

[09:37] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah, I think certainly it does have an impact, but I can also assure you, no younger child, no baby, wants to be categorized in that way. So growing up, so I did all those things. We went to the same schools. I had the same teachers you had. So I always had this benchmark. Growing up, it was always, your brother did this or your sister did this, and I was either as good, better, or worse. With everything in life, it was always as good, better, or worse. And maybe that's why I end up just ultimately not caring about that. But it's really interesting growing up, because you aren't the first to do anything, and so you're always compared. Now, on the plus side is that I always had this example. Maybe I love music. Maybe I don't have that love if it wasn't already laid out in front of me for the path. And so that path helps. And it. It certainly made me better at school, having older siblings that were going through it. And so it also adds this weird. You spend all the time in the house. Whenever you're in the house, you're doing all these things together, and you're learning all these things together, but you're older, you have an older group of friends, and I never saw us that different. Yeah, there's some years age, but whenever we're at home, we're doing all the things together, and then, so whenever, as you get older and you get to do cool things, I don't get to do those things yet. I didn't get to sit in the front seat yet. Y'all were bigger and stuff like that. And that's a pure. It's a smart, safe thing to do. But as a child, you don't understand that. As a child, you see these people doing it. You ultimately end up doing everything they do. Why can't you do it now? And I do think I have a fear of exclusion. And, like, whenever we would go visit our larger family in Fort Smith, Arkansas, there were 13 cousins, our family included, and there was one that was significantly younger than me.

[12:07] SARAH WARREN: She was the baby.

[12:08] MATTHEW WARREN: She was, like, actually a baby, but I was the youngest other than that. And all the adult boys would always go pair off. Not all adult, older boys go pair off. The girls would always go pair off. And it just left me being me. And so it's weird because you end up in feeling excluded in certain groups, and I think it still sticks with me to this day. It stuck with me. Whenever I was young, I was always making friends and reaching out to those that were getting picked on or I felt were getting left out, because I know that sucked. And so a lot of my friends growing up was never people that had a lot of friends anyway. It was always people that needed friends, and I think it kind of resulted from those instances.

[13:05] SARAH WARREN: It's interesting that you say that, because I actually think that's something we have in common. That's a trait that I'm proud of. When people say, tell me about yourself. Tell me something interesting about yourself. And one of the things I say is, I hate to see people excluded, you know, I don't know. I've never really thought about it before what maybe that had to do with you or with our older brother growing up or being the middle child. It's interesting. I could talk about being the middle child and how it's so funny that you had the perception of sometimes being overlooked, and I had the perception of sometimes being overlooked. And it's just interesting. It's interesting to hear that.

[13:44] MATTHEW WARREN: You know who else we get that trade from?

[13:47] SARAH WARREN: Our mother.

[13:48] MATTHEW WARREN: Our mother.

[13:49] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[13:49] MATTHEW WARREN: Our mother is a type one diabetic.

[13:52] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[13:53] MATTHEW WARREN: And she was born in 57.

[13:55] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[13:56] MATTHEW WARREN: And that was before the insulin pumps and the things that could regulate more readily. And back then, the only real solution was just to not have sugar. And she tells plenty of stories about bringing popsicles to school and her just simply not being able to have it, or else she could die, which is a very, very real, very serious thing. But you could see it in her. And my mother hates. Our mother hates to see people be excluded. I think we picked that up from her.

[14:32] SARAH WARREN: Yeah. I think that she was a kindergarten teacher, too, and she used to talk about wanting the children in her classroom that maybe the other teachers would think would be challenging because she felt like every child deserved to feel wanted and included. When I was a camp counselor, that was also something that I felt like I got to put into practice was I never let a kid sit by themselves.

[14:55] MATTHEW WARREN: That's right.

[14:58] SARAH WARREN: Okay, so let's talk about playmates. They say when a sibling. So I was reading about birth order and siblings because I'm about to have a second child, and I saw somewhere I may not get this exactly right. And like you said, I'm an academic, so it's gonna bother me if I say it wrong, but from my memory, with just pregnancy brain right now, siblings that are more than four years apart, the older child tends to function more as a caregiver. But children, siblings who are less than three years, apart the older child functions more as a playmate. So I was kind of right in the middle of that. We were about. I was three years, four months separate from you. Did you see me more as a caregiver or a playmate in childhood?

[15:44] MATTHEW WARREN: After I answer, I'd love to hear how you perceive it.

[15:47] SARAH WARREN: Okay.

[15:48] MATTHEW WARREN: But I can assure you, I saw you as a playmate. I saw you as an equal. I didn't like being told that. I didn't like any hierarchy between us. Not. Not that. Didn't trust your respect to you. It's just simply the. We. We are playmates. We're equals. We do stuff together. We can work on things together. I can be just as skilled as this, and. And if I wasn't, I'd practice to be. So I did not hear it as a caretaker at all.

[16:18] SARAH WARREN: Never.

[16:19] MATTHEW WARREN: You, did you. Which way did you perceive it as a.

[16:23] SARAH WARREN: You know, I think growing up as a girl in the eighties and the nineties, I think there were expectations. I think the answer may be different if I were your brother and not your sister. I think even if we were in closer in age, there would probably be some feelings of caregiving just because of how I was raised, but I would say both. I think we played really well together. I would be happy if my children played in the same way that you. You and I played growing up.

[16:53] MATTHEW WARREN: You already got in the karaoke machine, so they're, like, halfway there.

[16:56] SARAH WARREN: And the DJ.

[16:57] MATTHEW WARREN: And the DJ. My nephew Valentine also has a DJ mixing, like, kids table.

[17:05] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[17:06] MATTHEW WARREN: Music is just a big part of our life, for one reason or another, gonna come naturally.

[17:12] SARAH WARREN: Okay, so here is another question. So you've talked a bit about your upbringing and our relationship. What's something that you think I should be mindful of in raising siblings? And maybe a subsequent question to that. What do you think is a parent's role in facilitating a sibling relationship? Or do you think the parent only has the responsibility to the individual child?

[17:41] MATTHEW WARREN: Um, first and foremost, they are individuals and treat them as such. Uh, just. It's easy to say. It'll be easy to say Valentine like this. Therefore, um, your next son will, as well, and to kind of guide and, uh, nurture them towards those things and encourage. Just let it. Let it breathe. Maybe they will. Honestly, he's gonna, to some extent, see Valentine do it and want to do those things. But there's gonna be some things that they just don't like doing and be cognizant of that. Encourage, encourage things that do. Put them into positions to work together and be a team. Because some of my favorite times growing up was getting to spend the time with you and Andrew and do the bigger kid things. Yeah.

[18:44] SARAH WARREN: Yeah. That's interesting about children being different. They tell you every pregnancy is different, and that's true in my second pregnancy. And one thing I've noted is that when I was pregnant with Val, it was. He used to bounce, and there was this cycle to it, this pattern to it of it was very rhythmic and very measured. Now, even as a child, even as a baby, he loved to bounce, he loved to swing, but it had a very distinct beat and rhythm to it. He's very particular about things and organization and neatness. And this pregnancy, the child, I say, he's like animal from the Muppets. It's more chaotic. And so I'm wondering, when the child gets here, I don't know if they'll still have that same type of pattern like behavior that I see with Val. I think he's going to. I don't know, but it seems like he's going to be type a like his father. You know, maybe this child is going to be more go with the flow. And is it because of birth order, like you said, or is it because something innate that was even there before he was born? I don't know. I think we want to see.

[19:56] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah, it'll be. It'll be a fun experience to find out, but, yeah, I don't think it'll be. I don't think. I don't think he'd pick it up in the womb.

[20:07] SARAH WARREN: Well, we'll have to listen to this recording in 20 years and see. Yeah, yeah. So what do you hope your nephews understand about you as an individual? And the follow up question is, what do you hope they understand about our relationship with siblings?

[20:25] MATTHEW WARREN: I'll answer those questions individually, so you might have to re ask me the second one.

[20:29] SARAH WARREN: Okay.

[20:30] MATTHEW WARREN: So what do I hope that my nephews ultimately know about me? I think it's easy, especially when you're young, to look at adults and see these complete, well round, maybe not well rounded, but these complete images of people. I hope. I hope what they come to learn over time is that I am none of those things. I hope they come to understand me as a human. I hope they come to understand me as somebody that's willing to be honest, that's willing to talk about where I fail, someone that's willing to celebrate where I win and sharing those with them. And I hope that I provide them an example of what it is to do that, because I do truly believe at a core level, like, the reason why humans are here and the reason for family and all those things is to. Is simply to be together. And I hope that they can see that in me, and I hope that I get to celebrate and experience that with them.

[21:51] SARAH WARREN: What do you hope your nephews understand about our relationship?

[21:55] MATTHEW WARREN: I hope they understand that it is earned. There's special bonds about siblings, and a lot of it is shared experiences, shared drama, and because there's nothing that can form relationships like shared trauma. But you come together and. But there's plenty of siblings out there that just aren't that way. And they. And we're fortunate to have what we have, but it's not coincidence. It is something that you got to work at. It's something you got to spend time at. You got to. You got to build over time. And simply being brothers isn't enough. You got to try, just like any relationship in life. And I hope that they learn from ours that we don't agree about everything we have, our disputes, but we're also adults and capable of listening, talking, and laughing, and we work through things.

[23:05] SARAH WARREN: Yeah, that's interesting that you say it takes work. I absolutely agree with everything you said. There's also something very natural about it as well, where you are sometimes the only person in the world that I don't have to say it out loud, and I know that you understand, and that's not something that my husband can give me or that anybody else can give me maybe one day or maybe my children one day. But until this point, I think that out of that really kind of cosmic, natural, wavelength level connection that that's something that you and I have, and whether we worked for it or earned it or whether it's something that naturally happened, I don't know. But it's there.

[23:58] MATTHEW WARREN: That's fair. That's an interesting point. And I think a lot of it comes from our upbringing, the way our parents communicate with us, the humor aspect of how we laugh in awkward and difficult moments and items like that. It kind of leads to. It's often because what I'm thinking is what you're thinking. And it's just the reaction that through our, if we're all the culmination of all of our personal experiences, we share a lot of them.

[24:31] SARAH WARREN: Right.

[24:32] MATTHEW WARREN: And so we're capable of recognizing that and when we differ, we still know each other well enough to know how they differ. And through empathy and years of knowing each other, even if it's not how I would feel. I feel as though I know you well enough as a person that I can understand how you may feel in that moment and then respond accordingly.

[25:02] SARAH WARREN: Well, Matt, that's the questions that I have. Would you like to ask me some questions? Or look at these questions.

[25:13] MATTHEW WARREN: So you're able to tell me about your first memory of me? So I'll turn the table. So what's your favorite memory?

[25:21] SARAH WARREN: Oh, I don't know. That was pretty good. That, like, coming up with plays, which, when you say, being the youngest child, it's totally driven by what your older siblings interests are. I, like, always had a flare for the dramatics. There's these photos of you growing up where I have you in my ballerina tutus. And, you know, it's so funny because we ended up as adults even going to the drag show together. Like, well, this is not your, your first time seeing drag. I put you in drag as a baby. That, yeah, I thought, you know, were you my playmate or caregiver? I don't know, but I sure had fun treating you like a baby doll for a little bit. We played a lot together, a lot of pretend. So I would think a lot of my favorite memories were just, like, the playfulness, the, like, creative element that we had together. We saw a lot of shows together, did a lot of music stuff. Yeah, I would say probably the same. Watching you become an uncle in adulthood, that's been really fun because, you know, I remember long before I had a child, you had said that you thought I, childhood was really interesting because you're always learning something new, and that's true. And it's fun to watch you and Val and how excited he gets through you and how, like, now on my phone, he can go to my favorites, and he can click on your picture when he wants to FaceTime you, because he knows that will bring you up. It's just been really fun seeing the transition from just this little baby who knows nothing about anything now. He still doesn't know all that much. At three, he's got, like, ten friends, and they're all adults, really, our family and Max. But it's been fun to watch that relationship.

[27:20] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah. And I am impressed, and I am surprised with how much I do enjoy have in Valentine and. And I look forward to future nephew. I'm gonna double back to the just because I think it's on topic, and it's something that we both understand, but it might be interesting, is I have a request that neither of my nephews call me uncle.

[27:52] SARAH WARREN: Yes, that's true.

[27:53] MATTHEW WARREN: I do not want to be uncle. I am their uncle. Uncle is a. Is a thing. It's just like.

[27:59] SARAH WARREN: But not a brother.

[27:59] MATTHEW WARREN: You don't call me brother Matt. And it's because I feel like Uncle Matt puts a weird hierarchical, like. Like, it's a term of respect, and, like, yes, I want him to respect me, but I'm not gonna be calling him nephew Valentine or anything like that. I always want him to be on the same level as me. Whenever I talk to him, I always bend down and try to be as close to eye level with him as possible. I don't feel like I got that from our uncles growing up. I always felt like I was on their. That's a word I can't say here. I was on their bad list. I don't know if I was just needing attention and annoying as a child. I don't know, but I just always felt like they didn't want me there, and I never want Val to feel that way.

[28:52] SARAH WARREN: So tell me, is there something that you hope for, like, to be able to do with Val and your new nephew? Is there, like, something, like, do you have, like, a nephew bucket list or. Wow. It'll be really fun if we. If I could take him to Atlanta to Tia's trap museum and escape room.

[29:15] MATTHEW WARREN: Geez, I honestly never really thought about that. I just kind of want to give me a minute. I. Whenever it comes time for them to, like, start playing video games, I know pals, like, nearly already there. He's got screens in front of his whole life. But, like, I do want to, like, play and, like, enjoy that with him.

[29:40] SARAH WARREN: Oh, yeah, he's good. He'll play in Mario Kart.

[29:42] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah. And part of, like, I do think part of the little brother syndrome is that I have no problem, like, watching people do things.

[29:49] SARAH WARREN: Oh, yeah.

[29:49] MATTHEW WARREN: Like, because a lot of time growing up, the. The. You only got, well, like snes Nes, they only have two controllers. I was the third sibling.

[30:00] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[30:00] MATTHEW WARREN: So you just result in. You just results in being the one that watches, and that's fine. And so you. You asked me the other day, like, why do you watch Twitch or anything like that? Oh, no. I always watch people play video games growing up. What's different now?

[30:15] SARAH WARREN: That's interesting. One of the ways I've tried to explain the concept of brothers to Val is Mario and Luigi. And, of course, the Mario movie's out. And actually, you made a big deal about that when it came out. And you set up a big movie night for Val. We made big palate and popcorn and made a big deal out of it. And he watches it a lot. But I've tried to explain it to him as, you know, how Mario and Luigi are brothers. Mario's the big brother. Luigi is the little brother. You're going to be the big brother. And then I always follow it up with, and Matt is mama's little brother. Or Matt. Matt. Sometimes I call you Matt. Matt is mama's little brother. And he has started to get it. He started to take his little toys that you gave him and would say, like, you know, Luigi is Mario's brother and play with him like that. So that's been something I've used to teach him about siblings.

[31:07] MATTHEW WARREN: So circling back to what am I excited to do? Do with them?

[31:12] SARAH WARREN: Yeah.

[31:14] MATTHEW WARREN: So I think a lot of times, like, whenever you're just a kid and you're growing up and maybe even, like, as a young adult, because you got to, like, prove that you know everything and things like that, is that whenever somebody hasn't seen somebody, something, or somebody hasn't done something, someone hasn't tried something, you gotta be like, what? You know, you just. I. What I try to do now is that what I've realized, because I'm never going to rewatch movies, because I want to rewatch movies. They kind of stick in my brain, and that is, I always want to try something different. Maybe it's because my whole life growing up, I was just doing things that other people had already done, so why would I do something again? But what I've learned is that what's really fun is taking something you love and letting somebody else experience it for the first time. So as he gets older, there's going to be a lot of, like, moving. I'm gonna want to watch with him and, like, different things to have that experience.

[32:09] SARAH WARREN: Brave little toaster.

[32:12] MATTHEW WARREN: Not. Not the brave little toaster. The brave little toaster is a terrifying movie for a four year old to watch.

[32:19] SARAH WARREN: We talked about trauma bonding. Yeah. You know, you kind of describe being a parent. Being a parent's really hard, but there are these moments where you get to share the things you love. And it's funny. I really like hip hop and rap and pop and dance, and Andrew really likes my husband. Andrew really likes rock and roll. And there was this moment where Val, like, both loved or still he both loves jump by Van Halen and then jungle boogie by cool and the game and Andrew and her kind of competing on, like, okay, what's he gonna, like, funk or is he gonna, like rock and roll? And, you know, we got him the dj set. We got him the karaoke. I'm really pushing the funk soul hip hop angle. Yeah, we'll see where he lands. Yeah.

[33:10] MATTHEW WARREN: Cool. Well, I don't know if I have anything else. Closing thoughts on the matter is that I'm really excited to have another nephew. I'm excited for Val to have those experiences. I'm excited for him to go through that process. I wouldn't have wanted to grow up without siblings. It is truly a great experience that I'm still reaping the benefits of much later in life.

[33:41] SARAH WARREN: Anything you want to say to this baby? We've talked about Val a lot, but what about this baby.

[33:49] MATTHEW WARREN: That if you're hanging out on my back porch, hold on to the rails?

[33:56] SARAH WARREN: Yes. Because Val fell off and broke his arm.

[33:58] MATTHEW WARREN: Yeah. He was my Valentine, my nephew. He was hanging out in the backyard one time, and he fell off a bench and broke his arm.

[34:07] SARAH WARREN: Anything else you want to tell this baby? Any words of advice about being a younger brother?

[34:14] MATTHEW WARREN: That it's okay to be what you want to be? You're going to figure that out eventually anyway, I hope. But knowing it from the jump's not so bad either.

[34:25] SARAH WARREN: Yeah. All right, well, thank you, Matt. I know this interview is a long time coming. We had intended to do it years ago, but I'm glad we did it today, because I think it gave us something really meaningful to talk about.

[34:37] MATTHEW WARREN: Yes. Thank you, Sarah. It's been a real fun time.

[34:41] SARAH WARREN: Yeah, it.