Me and my sister Brenda on the morning of my first day of school. That Big-10 tablet cost ten cents. If you couldn’t afford a dime, there were also Big-5 tablets.

The old house from Pictures in the Dark. I was surprised to see the house still standing when I visited Spokane again in the 1990s. The neighbors had planted flowers in their front yard, giving this picture a look of charm rather than spookiness.

The back yard on Sherman Street. Notice the trellis where Sarah from Pictures in the Dark dropped a quilt for her sister Carlie.

Very little has changed at the Spokane house since this photo was taken back in the 1950s. I’m in the middle between Brenda and Chuck.

Me, Pete, Daisy and Laura at a favorite retreat on the Oregon Coast in the 1980s. Daisy was a character in my book A Bundle of Sticks.

With the advance from my first book, How I Found Myself at the Fair, I bought Laura a horse. Telstar had been a good barrel racer, but Laura trained him in the English style and won many ribbons with him.

Laura and me the day she married Jim.

Laura and Jim’s boys. Big brother Sean taught Kyle the joys of Game Boy before he could walk.

Pete worked as a guide on the French Broad River in North Carolina. He wrote his master’s thesis on author William Faulkner while living nearby in Asheville, N.C.

Pete at his apartment in Nagahama, Japan. He taught English to Japanese students for four years after graduate school.

We are a family of readers. Pete has mastered the art of reading while walking. Here he is with future wife, Michiyo.

The whole gang at the Mauser-McCord wedding. (L to R) Jim Wilkins, Jeff McCord, Molly McCord, Bob, Sean Wilkins, me, Pete, Laura and Tim McCord.

Grandpa Bob. By the time Kyle was born, Bob had become an important part of the family.

One of my favorite pictures. This was part of a photo shoot to go along with an article I wrote about the launch of Space Shuttle Columbia—STS-90. Friends say this picture characterizes me because I’m always searching the sky for satellites, planets and stars, or hoping to spot a UFO.