Scheir madness
Example of star siblings gives this mother hope for future

By Cheryl Scheir
For the Dover Post

As the mother of two children who are both best friends and worst enemies, I hope to someday see this dream fulfilled: my children, living and working together in perfect harmony. 

Fat chance. 

Or is it? 

My hope is that my children will live their adult lives in collaboration. Perhaps as partners in a business (most likely, I fear, a joke and prank shop; joy buzzer anyone?) 

I imagine them as next-door neighbors, with their respective nieces and nephews frolicking in their adjoining backyards in lovely dresses and little white shorts suits. 

I’ve even contemplated them sharing an apartment or house at the college they will both whole-heartedly agree to attend. (No doubt, this cohabitation set-up could be the source of many a morally sketchy boy/girl guest situation, but certainly a well-placed “No Girls Allowed” sign should take care of that, right?) 

Surely my children wouldn’t be the first siblings to go it together in life. What about the Carpenters? The Osmonds? Venus and Serena Williams? Heck, even the Olsen twins!  These siblings were/are connected at the hip (or at least at the wallet), and I think my children could be them, couldn’t they?

Yes, I’m aware of the potential for eating disorders and shameless showboating, but, hey, at least the Osmonds aren’t too bad. And they’re really quite outstanding dental specimens, aren’t they?

My husband reminded me just yesterday about a great, old-time sibling act — a little flash in the pan called the Marx Brothers. Unless you’re part of the generation who’s grown up thinking that Harpo is Oprah’s production company, you’ll remember the brothers – Groucho with the eyebrows, Chico with the hat, Harpo with the horn, and the other two, Gummo and Zeppo, the straight-men who blended in with the scenery. 

I’m trying to imagine what it was like for Mrs. Marx when those five were growing up. Oh the antics! The pranks! The impossible nights at the dinner table! I mean, how many times do you think Groucho heard, “Put down that cigar, young man, and finish your homework! Why can’t you be more like your brother Gummo?”

I’d bet my life that put him in his place.

I was happy to discover in my research that the other comedically straight Marx brother — that would be Zeppo — was quite the well-rounded individual. Acclaimed by the brothers as the funniest of them all (perhaps they were joking), Zeppo actually was a multiple patent holder. Seriously! According to his bio on Marx-brothers.org he invented something called the Marman clamp; it’s used in almost every modern moving vehicle, including the plasma spectrometer on NASA’s Cassini orbiter. 

As I like to say, that’s not nothing. 

Gummo, too, was handy in the workshop. Apparently, while the other brothers were yukking it up on stage, he got out there and nabbed patent number 1,320,335 for a laundry packing rack. Unfortunately for him, the product failed because of a spike in cardboard prices.

I guess by that time, his mother had changed her tune.

“Don’t worry,” I can hear her say. “You can always fall back on comedy.”