The family story that we, in my family, are most proud of is the story of a cousin of mine who is now 87. She’s more like an aunt, really, and I go out to Sacramento to see her a couple of times a year. Without going deeply into her story I will just say that, at the age of fifty, living in a jungle in one of the regions of the Amazon River, she lost her husband and only child, a daughter, to a terrible strain of malaria, a strain which she also contracted and survived. Then, all alone, she survived for 5 more months until those who regularly supplied the family with staples, found her, having been unaware of her plight. I will add to that that she was legally blind and legally deaf since childhood. My daughter grew up with that story as an assurance that there was a vital strength in our family line, and people to be fiercely proud to call your own.