Those six brothers were as fine a set of boys and young men as one could want, but they did talk a lot. By the time I made my belated appearance into the family, they were so well gifted in the flow of conversation that there were few pauses for the addition of one small female voice. So I grew up listening. Family recollections would indicate that I was just one sentence short of being completely mute—my single comment of record (at age four) was "Thank goodness that noisy thing is gone." The noisy thing was my brother Arden, whose goings and comings were as turbulent as a high wind gusting through the house.