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Doctors and researchers can tell you all about colorblindness. I do not know all the details of the hows and whys of being colorblind, but I do know what it is like living with a family with varying degrees of colorblindness.

My maternal grandfather was totally colorblind. He and my grandmother had thirteen children, six girls and seven boys. Four of the sons were colorblind. Three of the girls were colorblind. My mother is one of the colorblind girls. Was it blind luck, pun intended, that she married a man who is totally colorblind? What are the odds? I guess we will have to ask an expert. As it turned out, my parents had three sons and two daughters. My three brothers are colorblind and I have a form of colorblindness. The only person in our house, as we were growing up, was my sister, Deb, who could tell us that our clothes did not match.

Our family lived a strange, but interesting life. Those of us for whom color was no big deal, embarrassed the one who could see our mistakes. Neighbors often commented on the drab grays my father chose to paint his boats, house trim, sheds, and anything else in the yard that needed a coat of paint. My grandfather would buy my grandmother the same purple dress each year for her birthday. My aunts, the ones who saw all colors, would tell the story of their mother's closet full of purple dresses with only slight differences in style or design. Those of us living in a limited world of color or no color at all, usually pick a color and stick with it. For me, the color was brown. I may have had many shades of brown, but that was my basic color.

My mother-in-law noticed that every photo of her granddaughter sported a brown dress, pants, shirt, or shorts. She suggested some colors my daughter might look nice in. I suggested she help me shop.

The funny thing about those who know we are colorblind is their asking of the same question and expecting a different reply. "Can you see the color___________(fill in the blank)?" Or they might point to an object and ask what color we think it is. Why this game is amusing is any one's guess. Being colorblind may not be a life-threatening disease, except in certain cases that I will elaborate on shortly, but it is annoying.

Believe it or not, my father is an electrician. He is an excellent electrician. He cannot see colors. He has always had an assistant who could. I remember a time when I was around sixteen, that my father's assistant was very ill with the flu. My father asked me to go on a house

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