Unflappable

Friends,

We just had the opportunity to spend two weeks with my folks and it was great. We had to take them back to DFW today; it was hard to see them go, but we look forward to meeting again in the near future, Lord willing. While they were here, we were able to enjoy a number of activities. We had a nice dinner with the Beers' Saturday evening. Also, we traveled down to Giddings to see some family friends about a week ago. Along the way, near Flat (a funny name for a place that is hilly, by the way) we saw an Embarq work truck alongside the road. He was a few hundred yards ahead of us when -- all of the sudden -- he pulled out in front of us and into oncoming traffic. Going 60-70, I didn't have alot of reaction time, but I honked the horn and swerved around him to the left, borrowing the other lane momentarily. Thankfully nothing else was coming; it was a relatively close call. As Mom, Kim and I were gathering ourselves, I asked dad how he was doing. In "dad fashion", he said, "well, for a second there I thought I was going to get to try out your passenger air bag." Ha ha! Dad always seems to have a pithy or funny statement for most things, which is disarming in a situation like we faced; instead of being stressed out, we were able to laugh. This unflappable quality is one of the things that makes him so endearing. I appreciate my dad and mom both for their love and helping me to understand what life really is all about. As I get older, I really try to better follow my dad's example of "don't sweat the small stuff -- and most of it is small stuff." A good lesson for anyone to learn.

Don