When we were very small children, before we were in school, my mother 
took my sister Collette and I up to the school where our dad taught, 
which was just a block from our house.. She pointed to a line in the
sidewalk and told us how, under no circumstances, were we to go over
that line. So during recess, Collette and I would walk down to the 
school and stand with our toes right up to that line  
watching the older kids play. Occasionally, we jumped across the  
line in an act of momentary rebellion, but for the most part, we  
stood right there, not crossing the boundary. And for Collette, it  
was the beginning of a life lived with her toes right up to the  
lines of convention.

Collette was tall as a teenager. She was taller than I was for  
several years, which made introductions embarrassing since people  
just assumed she was older. And although her height was sometimes a  
source of discomfort. Collette didn't let it stop her from following  
her own fashion sense. She wore clothes of her own design, which she  
made herself. It didn't keep her from developing an outgoing  
personality either.

When Collette was ten and I was twelve, we moved from a ranch to the  
big city of Billings, Montana. We went from being two of thirteen  
kids in a one-room school to a huge grade school. The move left a  
mark on Collette, and she remembered the felling of being new and  
afraid to meet people so thoroughly that from that point forward,  
she made more of a effort than anyone I know to reach out a hand to  
people who had just moved to our town, or were new to our school.  
The girls she met in the next few years, almost all of whom fit into  
this pattern, still rank among her closest friends.

Collette shows a compassionate heart for the underdog, the  
unnoticed, the quiet loners. She shows a warmth toward these people  
that is admirable. And she puts her creative mind to use in letting  
the people close to her know what they mean to her. She is the most 
imaginative mother I know. Her three boys will someday realize how lucky  
they are to have every conceivable costume at their disposal. They  
will someday realize how lucky they are to have eaten some of the  
best food ever prepared in the kitchen of someone who is not a  
professional chef. They will someday realize how lucky they were to  
have been read to every night, and paid attention to with such  
selfless assurances every day. They will someday realize how much  
they were loved. And I hope Collette realizes now how much she is  
loved.