I Learned a Lot from my Parents

• The Australian crawl
• The backstroke
• The Four-in-Hand
• The half-Windsor
• The non-necessity of training wheels
• If you’re bored, read a book
• Shake hands firmly and make eye contact
• It’s who you know not what you know
• Grill a steak less than 1 minute/inch on each side, on a very hot pan
• Build a fire from the bottom up, inside out
• Treat every gun like it’s loaded
• Chew with your mouth shut
• If you don’t know which utensil to use, look at what everyone else is doing
• “Righty tighty, lefty loosey”
• Hitting never solved anything
• That said, if a bully is picking on you, hit him first and hit him hard
• Your hick second cousins on the farm are worth millions but those kids at school with the fancy cars and plastic houses whose clothes you admire so much — their parents are bankrupt
• Your parents had interesting, fulfilling lives before you were even imagined
• Every human being has dignity and is worthy of respect
• It’s OK to ask questions
• Lots of questions don’t have answers
• Don’t ride the clutch

As I was typing this I thought, “if someone ever asks me to give a commencement address, I will know exactly what to say.”