
Dear Doug,
My brother Doug was brilliant. I discovered how intelligent he really was when a door-to-door salesman knocked. It was the late 60’s. I was 8 or 9. Doug was my next oldest sibling. Three years separated us. I answered the door. The man looked official. He could have passed for a body double on the set of the Blues Brothers. The peddler was more Elwood than Jake, tall, ungracefully thin. Towering over my boyhood frame. Boot camp shiny shoes, black suit, white shirt, scant thin charcoal tie. Crowned with an ebony fedora. His left hand clutching a large black satchel.