The strangest thing of all

I don't quite know what I thought as a younger father, but I think I imagined complacently that our three sons would all be versions of each other. They would be a bit like Russian dolls, where each smaller doll fits into the other in a kind of infinite regress.

It hasn't turned out that way. Our youngest, Thomas, adores going to Sea Scouts on a Friday night. He likes dressing up and twirling his blue-and-white scarf; he likes the camaraderie and the ritual and sense of order.

Our older two sons are snidely dismissive of Scouts, the expressions on their faces suggesting that it's a cross between the Masons and the Ku Klux Klan. They wouldn't be seen near a Scout hall or jamboree, and being a pathfinder or making a fire to earn a badge is, to them, the very height of naffness. To them it seems, well, very Baden-Powell-ish and 19th century. One may as well bag an elephant or relive the Siege of Mafeking.

Thomas is musical, but only up to a point, while Jake, our middle son, definitely is. He has a natural sense of rhythm and a freedom and suppleness of his hand that allows him to play the guitar with a kind of insouciant confidence. Tom has a hard take-it-or-leave it approach to Jake's music. He's occasionally impressed, but for the most part looks the other way.

Sam, our eldest, isn't overly musical. He went through a Rolling Stones phase recently and has some fairly good tunes tucked away on his iPod, but he's a consumer rather than a musician. Music moves him but not in a way that makes him want to join the death metal band up the road.

Tom would laugh at the guys in the death metal band up the road. He might emulate some of their dress sense, but only in small and highly selective quantities.

Sam is cerebral. It sometimes makes him seem a little distant, even detached. Yet he's a sensitive boy, too; empathy is never far away and neither is compassion. For all of this, he can be single-minded to the point where he might not see the beggar on the street corner shuffling towards the partially open car window. Jake will see the beggar and encourage me to pass on my small change, yet at other times can be functionally insensitive. Once inside his music, though, he feels every word, every chord.

It's the strangest thing: we think they are all going to be so obviously alike when they're young. Once they've grown up, what seems to stand out is their difference and uniqueness. What complicates this is that they look similar enough to be brothers, yet their internal wiring, their DNA matrix, is very, very different. How can they have come from the two same parents?

Their creativity is very different too. Tom likes to draw; Sam likes to write computer code; Jake likes to tell jokes or learn new songs.

Jake is a good mimic, better than Sam, who isn't bad, and far better than Tom, who is hopelessly unfunny. He's very sweet, partly because he's the youngest, but he's still not very funny. Jake can be hilarious, particularly when he's in a slightly unhinged, show-offy mood.

Sam can be a little cutting, ironic, sarcastic. Tom likes to doodle; Sam likes to read; Jake likes to busk. They all love chocolate and Seinfeld and mom's pancakes.

They utterly despise rugby. They're generally positive about Trevor Noah. They support South Africa in everything - they're real dumb patriots. They're so different, yet all so strangely alike.