To my son whom I have not met. (Revised)

Don't listen to the critics, they seldom know what they are talking about.

Open the door for her every time, she's worth it.

Read books.

Read lots of books.

They'll be your fondest companions from time to time.

Listen well.

Don't just hear people, but really listen.

Make eye contact.

Don't be distracted.

Be the type of man that others describe using terms such as faithful and true and humble.

Give yourself away everyday to everyone.

No, they don't deserve it, but no one deserves anything in life.

Knowing this, live in and by grace.

Be a dreamer.

Dream larger than you know how.

Be a man who knows the value of a hard days work.

Enjoy sweating.

Enjoy achy muscles.

One day the ache won't go away.

Watch sunsets and sunrises every chance you get.

Now and then share them with someone you love.

Know how to cook a great steak.

Take care of your body, you only have one.

Fall in love with a girl who is already in love with Jesus.

Call her your second love.

Hold money loosely. Give it away all the time.

Be someone who learns to suffer well through trials and sorrows.

To do this I encourage you to read God's Word daily.

Memorize it.

It will save your life.

It will be your most difficult ministry, but love your family with the love of Jesus Christ always.

If you move away always call home on Sunday's.

Learn how to play an instrument.

Remember birthday's.

Have a favorite beer.

Don't give people bad or corny gifts.

Give from the heart.

Know how to play one sport well.

Sport is physical glorification.

Have at least three men in your life that know you very well and know three men in the same way.

Be open with them about everything.

Pray often.

Eat good food.

Live for the Gospel.

Let Jesus be the all-encompassing fire of your heart.

Love,

Dad

Processes of Thought: Past and Present.

Never stop.

Keep going.

Don't get behind.

Remember everything. Always.

give your time only to those who produce profit.

Slosh with muddied boots upon those who can't help you.

Don't turn the other cheek.

Gouge our enemies eye out every chance you get.

Forget about the plank sticking out of your head.

Let it go unchecked so long so that sparrows and finches build nests upon it.

If someone asks for your jacket, slap them in the face.

If someone is hungry and begging for food, double-bolt the front door, close the blinds and stay as quiet as possible.

Maybe they'll go away.

Maybe.

But now siblings...

Go out into the filth that is this world and wait.

When that still soft voice speaks then adhere to the formula of action.

Nothing is your own.

Everything is a gift.

Naked as we came.

Let humility be your shirt and pants.

Let it clothe you in warmth and grace.

Be the one who shows others how to wear humility well.

Even though it's an impossible task.

Go and sit on the street corner with the man whose family released him into the wild twenty some odd number of years ago.

Remember his name.

Remember that story that he told you about his wife and how he still remembers what she smelled like in the spring time.

Try as hard a you can to pray for him.

I can promise you that when you get to heaven he'll be the one greeting you with open arms.

Every once in a while, go and be quiet.

Not in your room or in your closet.

Go sit or stand or kneel in front of something bigger than you.

Something you can't quite grasp.

Something that, even when you really try, you can't even begin to understand.

Always make sure that you are not your own.

Try real hard to remember that not even your limbs are your own.

All of you is for something and someone else.

Never you.

Never.

Without.

Rapid acting wrinkle cream.

Instant gratification.

A quick profit in the quick silver age.

Fast cars on faster roads.

You look fat you know.

People have been telling me.

Try this and do that and you'll be skinny.

But never skinny enough.

Don't forget to buy that thing that you saw on the TV because without it you'll die.

And remember not to listen to that small voice that tells you to simplify.

What does it know?

Be sexy.

Never forget to be sexy.

Sex is the end all be all.

By having sex with everyone you won't feel like you've missed out.

It feels really good.

If it's hard or difficult to do then leave it for the poor.

Sell yourself.

Sell yourself to the product on the shelf.

Sell yourself to the guy at the bar.

Sell yourself to the ideas of the politician.

Sell yourself to the people who are making you their god.

Cut down as many trees as you can.

If possible, clear cut a mile a day.

Trample the poor.

Laugh at the weak.

Ignore the lonely.

The man in the barn.

The drifter had been staying in the back of the hay barn for almost two whole weeks now. In the mornings he would help daddy move the horses to the feed pens. Throughout the day daddy would have him mend the fences on the back of the property near the oak hills.

On that Friday when he showed up I had been swimming in the tank that sits down below the road that leads to town. I stood behind the oak that gives shade to the tank as he went to the front door and talked to mama and then she called to daddy who was in the barn. He and daddy talked for a long long time, about what I do not know. But I do know that he scared me. He had a very ugly face and a scar on his left cheek than ran deep as if he was knifed by someone who really wanted to make sure that he would never forget it. His skin was dark from many days in the sun and dust and his hands were leather.

Sometimes I would look out of my bedroom window upstairs and would watch him. He didn't speak much and didn't do much else but help daddy with his work. When he wasn't working though he would sit in a chair leaned up against the west facing wall of the barn and just stair out into nothing. Sometimes I thought that he was thinking about a family that he might have had back somewhere else. or maybe he was just the type of man who didn't think about anything. But I knew one thing for sure, I didn't care for him.

The men in town who kept to themselves tended to be the type of men that everyone else whispered about at the grocery. They were the men that mothers kept their babies away from when they were shopping in town. And now we had one of those quiet men living in our barn.