Your picture makes me smile

Ethan, this picture of you grinning and swinging makes me SMILE from ear-to-ear. I love this picture so much that I made it my computer desktop background.
I love you, baby boy,
Granddaddy
PS. Call me sometime: 931-598-9160

There's a man's face in these beans

Ethan, can you find the man's face in the coffee beans?Yes, the man is really there! Did you find him?
I love you, little boy!
Granddaddy
PS. Call me: 931-598-9160

"Tie me kangaroo (washer) down, sport"

Ethan, on Thursday afternoon I drove to McMinnville, Tennessee, a picturesque little middle-Tennessee town, which is located about 40 miles from Sewanee to purchase a new washing machine for our Irish cottage. Our "magic box" had given up the ghost and I needed to get us a more reliable machine than the one we were using (I called it the magic box because it didn't have an agitator and I was NEVER able to quite figure out how it washed the clothes... if I opened the lid while it was washing and tried to peek in to see what was going on, the machine INSTANTLY stopped?).
Back to my story... I ended up buying an almost new Kenmore repo for $300 less than retail... it WAS a beautiful machine with ALL the bells & whistles ("WAS" being the operative word). Before I got to McMinnville I stopped by my friend Tink Driver's salvage yard on "Possum Paw Road" and bought two 4' X 8' sheets of 3/4" plywood which wouldn't allow me to close the tailgate of the truck (before retirement Tink had been a VP for Reader's Digest... interesting guy... I'll write about his "dirt overcoat" and 15 Corvettes some other time).
We loaded the machine onto the plywood and pushed it tight against the cab/back window. They suggested that I tie it down but "Mr Know-it-all" declined, thinking it would ride safely right there. Twenty-five minutes later while speeding down I-24 at 75 miles per hour in HEAVY interstate traffic, I looked in my rear view mirror and watched the washer shoot out the back of the truck into an oncoming $50,000 Infinity automobile followed closely by a cavalcade of 18 wheelers also going 75 MPH (why couldn't it have been a $200 1962 Ford Fairlane). I watched in horror as the machine slid down the pavement with sparks shooting out in every direction. The good Lord had his hand on me because the Infinity was able to stop on a dime and actually pushed the washer off the road onto the shoulder like a bull dozier. The big trucks changed lanes without slowing down and what could have been a catastrophe was averted! PTL!
I checked with the lady in the Infinity to see if she was alright... she was and drove off looking a little annoyed. I spent the next 20 minutes picking up broken pieces on both sides of the east bound Interstate.
Baxter, my Cedar-Crest-Velvet-Earred-Nucklehead, was with me and he would have helped me lift the washer into the back of the truck if he had had thumbs. I was able to get it back on by myself (adrenalin I guess?)... and tie it down this time.
Looking for a silver lining to my Thursday afternoon cloud, I realized that I had developed and perfected a new way to sand down the front of any kitchen appliance in preparation for repainting. Just get a friend to push the subject appliance out the back of the truck at 75 MPH.
Actually the story has a relatively happy ending. I took the washer back to McMinnville Friday and the appliance guy fixed the machine for free and tested it while I waited (I offered to pay him but he was having too much fun making jokes about my misfortune). I thought I'd contact Whirlpool (Kenmore) to see if they'd like to buy my story as a testimony to the durability of their appliances. Here's the washer after I repainted it:I love you, Ethan!
Granddaddy
PS. Call me: 931-598-9160

Some good advice from a ninety-year-old lady

Written by Regina Brett, 90 years old, of Cleveland, Ohio

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote some lessons life taught me..."

• Life isn't fair, but it's still good.
• When in doubt, just take the next small step.
• Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
• Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.
• Pay off your credit cards every month.
• You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
• Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.
• It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.
• Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.
• When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
• Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.
• It's OK to let your children see you cry.
• Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
• If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.
• Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.
• Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
• Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
• Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.
• It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
• When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.
• Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
• Over prepare, then go with the flow.
• Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.
• No one is in charge of your happiness but you.
• Frame every so-called disaster with these words 'In five years, will this matter?'
• Always choose life.
• Forgive everyone everything.
• What other people think of you is none of your business.
• Time heals almost everything. Give time time.
• However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
• Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
• Believe in miracles.
• God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.
• Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
• Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.
• Your children get only one childhood.
• All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
• Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.
• If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's,we'd grab ours back.
• Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
• The best is yet to come.
• No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
• Yield.
• Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

Remember that I will always share my spoon with you!

Friends are the family that we choose for ourselves.

I love you, little man,
Granddaddy
PS. Give me a call sometime... I'd love to hear from you: 931-598-9160

Dolphins blowing bubbles and some good advice

Ethan, dolphins are such neat mammals (you might think they are fish but they are air breathing animals... and VERY smart)... they are almost like humans. Here is a really cool video that shows you something they do to amuse themselves:

Some people like him... some people hate him. In any event here is some good advice from Pastor Rick Warren, the author of A Purpose Driven Life:
"You will enjoy the new insights that Rick Warren has, with his wife now having cancer and him having 'wealth' from the book sales. This is an absolutely incredible short interview with Rick Warren, 'Purpose Driven Life ' author and pastor of Saddleback Church in California.
In the interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, Rick said:"
People ask me, What is the purpose of life?
And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were not made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven.
One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body-- but not the end of me.
I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity..
We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.
Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one.
The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort; God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy.
We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.
This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.
I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore.
Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.
No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on.
And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for.
You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems:
If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, which is my problem, my issues, my pain.' But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.
We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her- It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.
You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.
Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy.
It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease.
So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.
First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit.. We made no major purchases.
Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.
Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation.
Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.
We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity?
Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?
When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better. God didn't put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do.
That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.

• Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
• Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
• Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
• Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
• Every moment, THANK GOD.

I love you, Ethan,
Granddaddy
PS. Call me sometime: 931-598-9160

United States Naval Academy

Ethan, when I finished high school at St. Andrews School in Sewanee, Tennessee where I live now, I entered the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. 10,000 other young men applied to be a member of the class of 1968 (there were no girls going there back then) and only 1,350 were accepted and were sworn in with me on June 30, 1964. The first year (4th Class year) is known as Plebe year. The upper class were very hard on us mentally and physically in order to mold us into Naval officers. The academics were also very difficult so the first year was extremely hard in every way. I graduated on June 5, 1968... after four years we had lost 500 of those that were sworn in that first day in 1964. My class company started with 36 young men and when we graduated we had lost all but 22. Some couldn't take the hazing & 24/7 pressure... several flunked out... one was thrown out because of an honor violation and one got married. All in all it was a very demanding four years. I earned a Bachelor of Science degree and was commissioned an Ensign in the United States Regular Navy. After commissioning I reported to my first ship, the U.S.S. Nicholas (DD-449) which was home ported in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Here is a picture of me taken my senior year at St. Andrews... I was 17 years old:Here's a picture of me during one summer at the Academy. I think I was 20 years old and on a summer training cruise to the Mediterranean Sea.This is a video about the Academy:

I love you, Ethan,
Granddaddy
PS. Give me a call sometime 931-598-9160
PSS. I hope your Orange Tennessee shirt fits and you like it.

Ethan, I want to introduce you to a friend of mine

Ethan, I want to introduce you to a dear friend of mine, Darryl Sartwell. We became friends when I lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Darryl had many good qualities... he loved Jesus with all his heart... he was the most creative person I have ever known... he was a GREAT story teller... he had a wonderful sense of humor and was TONS of fun to be with... he was simply a very good friend. Probably the thing that Darryl was most proud of was his four years in the Marine Corps and his one year in Vietnam (1966) (your great uncle Chris and your Great-Granddaddy Mauldin were both Marines). Darryl continued to volunteer with the Marine Corps Reserve's Toys-for-Tots Christmas program each year where the Marines collect toys for under privileged children. For his efforts the Marines invited him to Washington, D. C. several years ago to thank him for all he did for the program. He took his Mama (Georgia) with him and there are really funny stories I can tell you some other time about that trip. Darryl was four months younger than me... sadly he died last May 12th... he was buried in his Marine dress uniform. I miss him a lot. This is a picture of him:I'll tell you something my Daddy (your Great-Granddaddy) told me... "If in your life you can have five really good friends, you are blessed." Darryl was one of mine. Cherish friends in your life, Ethan.
I love you, baby boy,
Granddaddy
PS. Call me sometime 931-598-9160
PSS. Be looking for another package I sent to you last week.