I'm amazed at how inconsistent the age phenomenon is. On many occasions I have had a conversation with one of my young tennis students that went something like this: "How old are you, Hannah?" » “I'm five and a half years old. » "How about that." You are the same age as Anna. » “Oh no, she's not my age. She just turned five. » For a child, a year is a very long time, but as I approached middle age, the years seemed to pass at an increasingly rapid pace. Each of us only has a certain number of years before we die. I had my first experience of the death of a loved one in 1971. Mom was diagnosed with cancer while I was in Europe and died less than a month after I returned. My father's mother, who lived near us in Santa Barbara, died a month later. Mom was fifty-eight and had not lived a long or full life. Grandma was ninety-four years old and had lived too long. Life isn't always fair, that's a lesson I've learned and seen repeated more than once. I graduated with a two-year degree focusing on English in 1973 and married Kira later that year. Dad had moved into his mother's house while Kira, Deb and I lived in the old farmhouse next door. Kira's family owned a summer cottage on Grenadier Island. This is the same island where Heffernan's Restaurant was located, but their residence was on the west side rather than the east, and at the head of the island rather than the foot. The Duke location had the advantage of being located closer to the neighboring communities of Rockport, Ontario, and Alexandria Bay, New York. The west side of the island faces the Canadian mainland while the east side faces the Seaway. Grenadier's setting was quieter and boat traffic was more moderate than that of Comfort Island where...... middle of paper...... twice a week, but hitting tennis balls together, going fishing, hiking, or attending a professional sports competition was a rare occurrence. My experience with these activities was usually with a friend or under the guidance of a private camp program. I felt like I was missing out on something important without having a closer parent-child relationship with Mom and Dad. This helped me understand that it is important for children to have someone who listens to their concerns. I made it a point to speak to children as I would speak to an adult. I treated them as equals and had a genuine interest in what they thought. Because I treated the kids the way I did, I built relationships with them. As they became adults themselves, I didn't have to shift gears and adopt a new personality around them. We had already established a line of communication that works at all ages.