Ask Twilight - Family Matters

Q: Dear Twilight, we were surprised to find out that you had a brother! With his wedding over and the Mother's Day coming up, could you please tell us a bit more about your family, and the families of your friends?

A: Why does everypony always seem so surprised by my brother?! Anyway, my apologies for delaying my reply so long. I felt that I couldn't talk about my friends' families without asking for their permissions, and some of them were a bit hesitant. Still, in the end, they all felt that it would be good to make things clear.

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Starting with myself, Twilight Sparkle... well, you've seen my brother Shining Armor, and our parents, Star Sparkle and Crescent. We're not nobles, but our family has a long and illustrious history in the Equestrian civil service. Mom is a Senior Aide to the Comptroller of the Palace Administration, while Dad is a Permanent Undersecretary of the Foreign Ministry; their jobs aren't very glamorous, but they are important ponies and work very hard to keep the wheels of Equestrian government running. (This, by the way, is how Cadence ended up becoming my foal-sitter. Her mother is a career diplomat in addition to being the Princess-Marquess of Savory, and Cadence mostly grew up in the Palace.)

Shining Armor, of course, is a Captain of the 2nd Company of the 1st Unicorn Regiment of the Royal Guards. He's young for his position, but nopony can say he hasn't deserved it. At this rate, he will be the youngest Commander of the Regiment in several centuries. As you have no doubt noticed, Shining is almost ten years older than I am; my parents have told me that I came as a considerable surprise to them and him.

We used to be very close when I was a filly, but when Shining started in the Guards, and later when I first became Princess Celestia's student, we inevitably started growing apart. Even before I moved to Ponyville, we were seeing one another only once or twice a month, and after that, we mostly kept in touch via letters. However, for all of his good qualities, Shining is not very punctual about his correspondence, so I've scheduled in advance several visits to Canterlot to see him and Cadence!

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You have also seen Rarity's parents, and are of course familiar with her little sister, Sweetie Belle. Her dad, Magnum, is a retired hoofball pro who owns and runs a wagon store on the north side of Ponyville, while her mom, Pearl Buttons, is a former hoofball cheerleader. They met during the championship tournament in Baltimare, and immediately fell in love, as they are both quite happy to tell. They are very nice ponies, if a bit more boisterous than most unicorns, and quite well off. Indeed, Rarity's family is likely third wealthiest in Ponyville, right after the Riches and the Silvers!

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Pinkie Pie comes from a family of Maneonite rock-farmers from an unpleasantly barren region with the incredibly ill-fitting name of Dream Valley, in northern Equestria. Maneonites are Earth Ponies who try to stick with the Old Ways. They aren't opposed to unicorn magic or pegasus weatherwork, but they refuse to use those for anything they can do on their own. Unsurprisingly, they tend to gravitate for professions where strong back and work ethic are important, such as quarrying, rock farming and logging. Her parents, Clyde and Sue, are mostly retired now while her sisters, Inkie and Blinkie (short for Inkaterina and Blinkabeth; Maneonites tend to have old-fashioned and rather odd names) run the farm.

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The Apple siblings, unfortunately, lost their parents years ago, back when Applejack was still a filly and Applebloom was barely a year old. Their father Baldwin, Granny Smith's youngest son, died when a tree fell on him in the Whitetail Wood. Their mother Verna took the death of her husband badly and sunk into despair, barely eating and refusing to leave her bedroom for weeks. She was pregnant at the time, and sadly died only three months after her husband while giving birth to a stillborn foal.

Applejack has never outright stated it, but I feel the biggest reason she left Ponyville for Manehattan was to escape the memory of her  parents and the terrible months between their deaths. Her aunt Valencia, married to Mosley Orange, is her mother's younger sister.

Over her long life, Granny Smith had four sons and three daughters, and Applejack and her siblings have almost twenty cousins and dozens of second cousins and more distant relatives. The Apples and the Richs are related by marriage as well, much to the mutual disgust of Applebloom and Diamond Tiara, as Stinking Rich's sister Copper Cent married one of Granny Smith's brothers, and Filthy Rich's mother, Golden Apple, was Granny Smith's niece.

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Rainbow Dash is an only child. Unfortunately, she doesn't get along with her family. Her mother, Green Flash, works as an air traffic controller in Cloudsdale, and her father, Gentle Breeze, is a snowflake designer. From what I've gathered from Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, her parents (or at least her mother, who is apparently just as stubborn and headstrong as Rainbow herself) are opposed to her dreams of becoming a Wonderbolt and were disappointed and angered when she left the Flight School.

However, Fluttershy claims that there's been some signs of a rapprochement lately. Apparently, after Rainbow Dash won the Best Young Flier title last year, her parents have resigned themselves to her choice of career, and have said so in their recent letters.

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As for Fluttershy, she too is an only child, and her parents live in Cloudsdale as well. Unlike Rainbow's family, however they've always been supportive of their daughter, and they write to one another frequently. Apparently, her father, Cloud Break, is an ex-Wonderbolt, now one of the alderponies of Cloudsdale, while her mother, Goldmane, works as a doctor in the Cloudsdale Center for Altitude Medicine.


I hope this answers your question!

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Q: That's all very interesting, Ms. Sparkle, but what about Spike? Isn't he part of your family too?

Yes. Yes, he is.

And I'm ashamed to say that I take him as granted all too often, just as I did here!

Spike is the closest thing to a little brother I have - that I will ever have - and, sometimes, it almost feels like we're a mother and a son - not that I know what it's like to be a mother, I mean I've read on parenting, and with Shining Armor and Cadence married, I had to... Oh, now I'm rambling again. I'm sorry.

Okay.

Spike's been a part of my life ever since that wondrous, fateful day when I became Princess Celestia's student, was accepted into her School for Gifted Unicorns, and got my cutie mark. He was raised in the Palace for the first couple of years - I was much too young to take responsibility of another sentient, and dragon hatchlings are uniquely troublesome compared to even the most energetic foals, like the Cake twins! - but I saw him almost daily, after my private lessons with the Princess.

As we grew up, Spike started catching up on me. When I graduated from the School, and left home for the University, he moved into my dorm room with me, and we have lived together ever since. He was invaluable to me during my University days - not just as an assistant, though Spike is really helpful if he really focuses, but as an anchor, helping me keep my head whenever I was struck by exam stress or paralyzed by a fast-approaching deadline.

Like I said, I have a bad habit of taking him as granted. Thankfully, Spike's more mature than his age would suggest, and - as embarrassing as it is to say - sometimes more mature and understanding than I am. He's my number one assistant, my friend and, ultimately, my one and only little brother.