The sport which fit Norm's ideal was baseball and he served as pitcher for various teams. I recall hazy images of his ball games, especially those during which Mom and I crouched on the bleachers beneath a newspaper to ward off the rain, while she proudly feasted her eyes on the pitcher's mound with an inaudible, "that's MY boy" inscribed on her face. Dad's employment kept him from attending some of the games, but Mom always went, a fan until Norm lost his attraction for the game. Mom savors the memory of Norm being chosen to pitch yearly for the All-Star games. Todd never went to Norm's games. He didn't have much interest in sports. It's difficult to know whether or not being good at something makes you like it. I happen to know that liking something does not make you good at it, for I love to bowl, but once bowled a 16--amazing by anyone's standards. (I was in high school at the time.) At any rate, Todd preferred to forego physical activity of the competitive nature, electing instead to pursue his penchant for gadgetry, electronics and in general, anything that would spin or balance. When drying the dishes he was not content to simply lay a lid on the table; he first had to give it a hearty whirl on its rim, whereupon the kitchen would ring with a wavering "wong, wong, wong" until the swiftly fluttering lid collapsed onto the table with a final, resolute, "wop." Mom forbid such treatment of glassware and china, of course, or undoubtedly many items would have sustained irreversible damage. In effect, Todd was the mad scientist of the family, having to take mechanical objects apart to view and study their internal workings, and obtaining chemicals for his experiments which ate holes through his bedspread. He had infinite patience and stuck to an idea until it worked, even if it took all night. Todd was a licensed ham radio operator and collected all the necessary equipment to seek and find countless stations as well as other operators. Much of his spare time was spent behind the "rig," although he found equal enjoyment in playing with or annoying the huge spiders in our garage. It was Todd who tried to power his bicycle with an electric motor, and gathered scum and algae from the ponds to gaze upon through his microscope. He was also the only person in the family who could start a particularly cantankerous lawn mower. Todd loved the extraordinary and took time to notice the small things. One night, he took a walk down in the woods and found some fungi which glowed in a luminous shade of green. He returned to the house to report the strange phenomenon and together we threaded our way back down the dark trail to the uncanny sight. Sure enough, delicate points of light embellished the damp, rotting logs on the woodland floor, transforming decay into a hauntingly magical scene.