Now that the possibility of a war was no longer a factor, the holidays were wonderful. Pop and Lisa were avid chess players and got a friendly competition going. Pop was an excellent strategist, and Lisa was able to hone her skill while he was there. I played, but I didn’t approach their ability. Pop did show me how to win in 4 moves, a strategy that only works against someone very inexperienced or, at least, against someone who has never seen the strategy. It is impressive when you are able to pull it off.

When he got into the pool, we found that Pop was also an amazing diver and swimmer. He, like my dad, was the type of person who made you wonder if there was anything he couldn’t do. Mama was strictly the indoors type. She was an amazing cook and meticulous housekeeper. They had been married over 40 years and their interaction seemed like a well-oiled machine; each seeming to know the other’s thoughts and predict the other’s next action. My mom offered Pop some coffee and he accepted. She said, “Sugar? Cream? How do you like it?”

He hesitated a few seconds, then said, “I don’t know!” He had not fixed his own cup of coffee in years. Mama had to be consulted for the preparation of a cup of coffee for Pop!

When it came near the end of the holidays, it made me sad to think that my grandparents would be going home to Tennessee. It just didn’t seem right to only see them so little. My dad was, apparently, feeling the same way.

“Pop, why don’t y’all move back to Texas where you belong? What does Tennessee have that Texas doesn’t?”

“Mountains and music," replied Pop.

“Well, Texas has mountains, just not in Houston. As far as music, do you go somewhere to see people perform their music?”

“Well, not usually, we listen to CD’s.”

“Pop, I know this is gonna surprise you, but we have CD’s here in Texas. We’re not all cowboys and hats. As a matter of fact, the great majority of Texans are not cowboys, and the hats are mostly caps, many times worn backward and not taken off indoors. I don’t think most young men don't even know that they’re supposed to take their hats indoors.”

“You want to educate me about Texas? Did you forget I lived here most of my life? Texas is great, but you should see the mountains in Tennessee!”

“If you could move to Texas and look out your window and see the mountains of Tennessee, would you go for that?”

“Yes, I would, and I would love to see that. I would say it’s impossible, but I know better than to doubt you.”

“You got it, Pop! Get ready to move. I have faith, and The Bible says you can move mountains if you have faith the size of mustard seed.” I was pretty sure that my dad would go to my mom about moving the mountains in Tennessee to Texas. She could do some amazing things with photography, but I was skeptical about this. Still, doubting my mom or dad when they said they would do something was a losing bet. Even though I doubted, I was hopeful that my grandparents would soon be moving to Texas.

My dad bought the best digital camera he could find to send with Pop with instructions on exactly how to take pictures of the mountains near his house. He also gave Pop instructions on emailing the gigantic files that the pictures would produce.

When Pop and Mama left on the plane for Tennessee, both Lisa and I cried. I hugged Pop and whispered in his ear, “Start packing as soon as you get back to Tennessee.” He just smiled and nodded like “OK”. Of course, he thought my dad was joking about moving mountains. They made tentative plans for a visit next Christmas.

The Christmas holidays ended and Lisa and I went back to school. Lisa started lobbying for a car for her 16th birthday. I thought it was asking way too much. Lobbying, however, was Lisa’s strong point, and I just wondered what kind of car she would get. With us back in school, my dad designed a room attached to the back of our house by one of the bedrooms on the first floor. He had a carpenter build the room. I thought he was going to expand the room, but the addition looked more like a giant bay window.

My mom began spending almost every waking moment in her ‘lab’, working on her and Dad’s project. She was very secretive about what she was making. After I thought about it some, I realized it probably had something to do with ‘moving the Tennessee Mountains to Texas’.

The weather in Houston was such that there were days in the winter warm enough to swim. The water was colder, of course, so we spent a majority of our pool time perfecting our tans. Lisa would lie face down and untie the ties of her bikini top to keep from getting a tan line. I was satisfied having a tan link, however, because a tan line, especially on top, says ‘girl’, and I like (almost) anything that brands me a girl. I say ‘almost’ because a period is exclusively female, and I refuse to say I ‘like my period’.

After a couple of weeks, the room was finished. My mom, however, worked on her secret project night and day for about 3 months. One weekend, my mom and dad worked together moving equipment from mom’s lab to the new room. My dad took 2 weeks’ vacation and they worked together, perfecting what was now one joint project. The longer they worked, the more curious Lisa and I became. If they didn’t have a big lock on the door that led to the new room, we would have had a look in there. Lisa suggested picking the lock, but I reminded her about parents’ ‘radar’. I didn’t want to do anything to alienate my mom or dad. Our relationship was too good to do something to damage it.

Finally, the project was done. Mom and Dad invited Lisa, Aunt Katy, and me to have a look. He opened the bedroom door and we went in. What we saw was the most amazing sight I had ever seen. Outside the window, the mountains of Tennessee stood proud and tall. Above, you could see puffy clouds floating by. I heard Aunt Katy softly say, “Oh My God!”

After several seconds I finally spoke, “Dad, how did you get the clouds to do that? They look so real!”

“That’s actually the sky. It’s just enhanced a little to give it more contrast. Wait until tonight. You’ll see more stars than you’ve ever seen before!”

“How did you do that?”

“I used telescopes and other … gear.” He seemed reluctant to give more details, so I didn’t try to push him. “I can’t wait for y’all to see it!” He looked at his watch. My dad was more excited than I had ever seen him.

“This took a super genius like Uncle … like Daddy … and Aunt Kim.”

“I don’t mind you claiming him. He’s got plenty of love for all of us. That’s my dad.”

“Thanks.”

I added, “Pop said when Mama was pregnant they felt like she would have a girl, but didn’t know it was twins until late in her pregnancy. He said he found when they were born that love is not bound by the laws of mathematics, so when you have more than one child, your love is not ‘split’ between them, but it grows so that both children get 100%. You can tell he loves his twin daughters.”

“Pop is pretty smart, too. I’m glad we share him.”

“’Smart’ seems to be a characteristic of this family, but ‘love’ is too. I don’t think you can get a better combination than that.”

“Yes, and Pop’s pretty tough. I think sometimes I’d like for him to run into my dad. Then, I think I wouldn’t. I don’t want Pop to end up in prison.”

“Well, I don’t know what Pop would do but, as bad as your dad has treated y’all, I don’t think Pop is capable of murder.”

“No, he’d probably just mess my dad up pretty bad.”

“…wishing he was dead.”

Lisa did her best ‘man’ imitation. “Put me out of my misery’!” Her imitation always sounded like someone who had been smoking weed.

Dad called Pop and told him he had moved some Tennessee mountains to Texas, and asked him if he and Mama had finalized plans for another Christmas vacation visit. Pop said he would talk it over with Mama and let us know.

Dad had added an addition to the bedroom for the window. But he said he wanted to build one that would just replace a window without requiring the construction of a room. He asked Lisa and me if we wanted to work on it. We enthusiastically accepted, of course. As the end of the school year drew near, he began gathering materials for a second window. He decided the second would be the same scene as the first, the only difference is not requiring a separate room just for the window. Regular new windows can range from $200 up to $700, depending on the type and size of the window. I was sure those figures would be a pittance when compared with the cost of my dad’s window. I thought it was worth it, though, for anyone who could afford it. It was relaxing to view, and it would be the ultimate ‘conversation piece’. Dad bought 2 ‘state of the art’ computers for Lisa and me to use on the project. I tried one out and couldn’t believe the speed. Thankfully, he said we could use the computers for homework, but not to just ‘surf the web’ since the danger of viruses was always present. It was doubtful, however, that these computers would be infected, because they had ‘state of the art’ protection tied into my dad’s work. (With permission, of course … the company was unlikely to deny my dad any reasonable request)

We chose the window in Lisa’s room for the new window. As much as I liked the window, I didn’t want to lose my view of the pool. Lisa and I decided to share my room, so we moved all her stuff. That way, anyone wanting to see that window wouldn’t also see panties and bras, etc., on the dresser, or be tempted to meddle; men are pigs, you know. The rooms were humongous anyway. Working in my room made it handy because we could work any time. If we had an idea in the middle of the night, we could just walk over to the computer and work a while. We didn’t have to get up early, so our hours could be whatever we chose. It turned out, though, that we rarely worked well into the night, and I don’t think either of us ever got up in the middle of the night to work. I need regular sleep, otherwise, I feel sluggish the next day. Dad said I was like a bird; when it got dark I had to go to roost. I had to agree.

When we actually started work, we began to wonder if we were in over our heads. We had worked with Photoshop Elements, but now we were working with the expensive professional version of Photoshop. There were dozens of features we had never heard of and it began to seem like we would use every one of them on this project. We saw why the hours of work were required. There were details my mom and dad put into the project that seemed unimportant, but they said detail was the secret to the magic of the project. We didn’t want to disappoint my parents, so we were careful not to overlook or omit a single detail. Mom trained us on the art part of the product, then Dad taught us about the technical aspects. When I saw how difficult it was to learn all this, I became even more in awe of my mom and dad’s ability. Lisa and I did it only with a lot of instruction and guidance. Mom and Dad did the first window with only their own experience and skills.

About halfway through the summer, Aunt Katy announced that we had a “Patent Pending”. Lisa and I didn’t know all the legal aspects, but we figured it had to be good. As soon as she told my dad that, he gave her an additional list of things that went into the making of the window that needed to be patented. These were the things that made the window behave as though you were looking at a real scene. She went right to work on several new patents. If someone wanted to counterfeit a window, they would infringe on several patents, making infringement less likely and more costly for anyone caught infringing. My dad said as soon as we got the ‘patent pending’ on these other parts of the project, we would be ready to test market. We were under no illusions that thousands of windows would sell, maybe not even hundreds, they would just be too expensive. We hadn’t got Aunt Katy’s breakeven figures yet. She said she had the hours on the first project, but she wanted to see how long the second project took. Then, she would try to come up with a trend line. She said basing a trend line on two data points was a little better than guessing, but not much.

If we ever questioned needing to learn advanced mathematics, that question was settled. Dad knew the many complex equations off the top of his head. On rare occasions, he had to look in one of his books or on the web. The things he could do with the equations were amazing. I could see someday when he died, the scientific community wanting to preserve his brain for research a la Einstein. Years from now, he would be referred to as just ‘Brooks’, again, like Einstein. I can see it now: “Newton, Einstein, and Brooks”. Hey! It could happen!

I wasn’t hesitant to ask for help, but Lisa felt like she could do without help. She would struggle with something until she had no choice but to ask for help from either my dad or my mom, depending on the part of the project on which we were working. (I know almost everyone would say ‘the part of the product we were working on’, but my mom told me that habits formed in youth are habits for a lifetime, so I thought I’d better start getting my grammar right immediately. Forgive me if I slip somewhere later in this document. Grammar errors like that are easy to correct in writing, but in speech, it’s easy to forget, plus, depending on your audience, you may feel like you’re sounding pompous to use ‘on which’. Imagine that: sounding pompous because you use proper grammar, but that is the state of our society today. Sticking to the rule, however, can yield some strange sounding results. Once, when Winston Churchill was criticized for occasionally ending sentences with a preposition, he is quoted saying ‘This is the type of errant pedantry up with which I will not put.’ The grammar is correct, but the statement losses it ‘punch’. I diverge greatly. I’m out here in the woods now, but I think I see my track in the distance and will try to make my way back to it.)

The project was an excellent learning tool for Lisa and me. Our pool time and driving time dropped drastically, but it was voluntary. We thoroughly enjoyed our summer, and the time flew by, causing the beginning of school to be uponus before we knew it. We had enough done, however, so that we could work on it after school and weekends. We were excited to see our window take shape, and we were proud of all we had learned. My parents and Aunt Katy were proud of us, also, and they were not hesitant to praise our work.

It was November before the project could be labeled “completed”. The unveiling was as awe-inspiring as the unveiling of the first window. I found it difficult to believe that I had a part of such a project, and that the names “Sarah Rochelle Brooks” and “Lisa Michelle Rivers” would be on the project somewhere, if not on the patent. It was humbling that God allowed me to be a part of a family that could produce such an amazing work of art.

Next: “Mama and Pop can’t stay here!”