Manly, Graceful And Beautiful

My oldest brother will be 32 years old in December.

He is the tall one--he is 6'3", manly and graceful and beautiful--and he has the blonde hair and blue eyes that run in the family.

He has always been a math whiz since he was a boy. He went to M.I.T. for his undergraduate degree and afterward he went to Stanford for his MBA. Since graduating from Stanford, he has worked on Wall Street.

For two years he worked in London, sent there by his firm, and it was in London that he met his English wife. They met at a party, and my sister-in-law says that one look at "that big lug" was all she needed to know--she knew that she had found the guy she wanted to marry. And marry they did, and soon they moved back to New York.

My sister-in-law is a psychiatrist, but she has never practiced, as she got married and moved to New York as soon as she had completed her studies.

My brother is very serious about his work, but he is also very serious about his family--both his own family in New York and his family members in the Twin Cities and Denver. We all talk on the phone and email and instant message each other constantly, and that makes having one brother a thousand miles to the East and the other brother a thousand miles to the West somewhat more bearable.

My older brother loves to swim, and play basketball and handball and racquetball. He also loves to golf, a sport I despise. No matter the sport or the game, he plays to win. His competitive streak is always on display, whatever the activity.

When I was in law school in Washington, I would go to New York once a month to visit my brother and his family. I miss those visits now.