That the nicest man in the world just happens to be one of my brothers may be of some interest to you but it is an enormous incongruity to me and the source of one of life’s important lessons.

There was considerable friction between us...which simply means that we were pretty normal. Sharing bedroom, bath and closet does tend to raise the tension level between siblings. That and the fact that underlying all the fighting was my dreadful suspicion that, along with Tommy Smothers, I, too, could cry..."Mom always like you best!"

What Mother didn’t know was that lurking within this particular brother was a terrible and terrifying secret. Its revelation was one of the great learning experiences of my short life. In fact, one could probably trace most of my entire theology to this one particular event.

It began in a most mundane manner. It was a simple argument between brothers. It then escalated during the course of the day to somewhat grander proportions. By early evening the two of us were searching the Yellow Pages under "Hit Men".

Now I have never been a violent person, not even back then. I simply could not bear the thought of inflicting anything other than brief psychological pain upon my worst enemy...who, it just happened to be at this particular time, my brother.

The nicest man in the world.

Push did, indeed, come to shove and then to wrestling around on the round and then, suddenly, I found myself astride my brother’s torso, looking down at his sneering face. Seizing what I assumed to be a God-given opportunity, I cocked back my arm, clenched my fist and prepared to send this mortal enemy into a coma.

Only something happened.

A voice in the back of my brain whispered uninvited counsel.

"Don’t do it, Rich," the voice implored. "Let Norman up. Let your brother live."

I always have put great credence in apparitions such as this and so, with only the briefest of hesitation, I set him free, confident of my heavenly reward.

Whereupon he got up from the ground, smiled the strangest of smiles and knocked me silly.