Our children have inherited many of their father's traits, among them a sense of adventure, curiosity about the world at large, an eagerness to learn, and the urge to do things themselves. They have adapted their father's sense of creativity to their own and given it their personal stamp, becoming adept at art and in manipulating mechanics. From me they have no doubt inherited some traits as well, and possibly that's where the mental craft of arranging thoughts and words and conveying them through applied skills in communication comes in.

Our youngest, now in his 50th year, uses a bicycle for transportation every day, taking it from his house to the UBC campus where his office is located. He's a fresh-stream biologist, and he lives for experiences in the out-of-doors. British Columbia is perfect for him, offering him countless opportunities to get out into wilderness areas and become one with nature in the natural world if only temporarily. When he travels abroad as he does on occasion, everywhere from Ireland to Sweden, New Zealand to Australia, Italy to Spain, he also explores the natural surroundings to be found there.

About a decade ago he bought a second-hand Nissan truck with a cap, a smallish vehicle that had been used by a plumber. It now has 250,000 kilometres on it, and from time to time when it needs repairs our son tackles most of them himself. As he's preparing to do yet again. He can afford a new vehicle, but would always prefer to buy a used one. He feels the current models are much, much too gratuitously large and energy-wasteful. And he thinks he can easily get more use out of his elderly truck so he is not, at this time, interested in replacing it.

Most week-ends he goes off on overnight or several days of camping trips to various parts of the province. In the summer it's for canoeing or kayaking trips (he has built his own canoe and kayak), in the winter it's for skiing trips.  On the week-ends when he hasn't planned one of these many adventures in the out-of-doors, he does things around the house, or does pottery, or busies himself building something out of wood, because he loves working with wood, just as his father does. We have some wonderful pieces of furniture that he built. And he built them using traditional tools of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

He's a calm and collected person, someone who is always optimistic, never prepared to judge but to consider all angles of any situation. And he's generous to a fault.

Sounds like a typical mother.