A man much wiser than I, once said, "Through our children do we achieve immortality. For in each, a part of us lives on". So when someone wants you to look at pictures of their kids, their reason isn't just pride alone. They're saying, "Look at these. After I am gone, this is who will be carrying on for me". And when that child promises to be much more than we, ourselves ever were, that is what gives us that immense feeling of pride. Not in what we have done, but in what our children have done, are capable of doing, and will do.

Therefore, it gives me great pleasure to present here the pride of my life. My daughter Charlie. And also my Niece Becky. Usually where you find one, you find the other, when they are not in school or at work. I have watched both grow from squirming little infants into fine strong young women ready to, hopefully, mold the future into something better than the present.

Our family has never been photographers. And I don't have a lot of family photos. So, I raided Charlie's pictures to get these. Here is one of Charlie taken last year.

Charlie graduated from Valley Mills High this year, and will enroll in Tarleton State Univerisity this fall. For the past couple years, she has told me that she wants to be a Doctor of Vetrenarian Medicine. She has worked for Doctor Hampe at the Clifton Vet. Clinic for the last two years. But now she has changed her mind, (Will wonders never cease?), and wants to study Wild Life Biology. I ask her of she was going to be a Game Warden. She said, "No, but my boy friend is". But she is interested in wildlife management. Especially from a medical standpoint. This may be due some what to her friend, Mr. Joe Stevens. A retired wildlife biologist who worked for the state, and was affiliated with Texas A&M for many years.

Charlie loves animals. All animals. Sometimes, I feel like I'm living in a zoo. A while back, she brought home a kitten from the Vet. Clinic. It had been hit by a car and had a broken shoulder and a big caved in spot in it's skull. It looked like it was going to die, and the clinic was going to put it to sleep. But Charlie said, "No, let me have it. I'll nurse it back to health". And she did. The cat sits on the front porch here and meows at me. She named it "Lucky". One eye kinda looks off in space, but otherwise appears to be a cat.

She has a Black Lab she named Skullie. It has one brown eye and one white eye. At night, if the front porch light is off, it is wierd to look out the door and see only a single eye floating around out there. Skullie is a big baby too.

When Charlie was four, I bought her a little Welsh pony. Her name was Star. She had a single white star in her forehead. And so, Charlie learned to ride. When Charlie fell of, (Star never bucked), Star would stop and look to see where Charlie was at, then step to the side. Star was about fourteen years old when we got her. I have never seen a horse as gentle and as good with kids as she was. And ever since, horses have been a passion with Charlie. Ask her what she wants from life and she will tell you, "A thousand acres, 200 head of cattle, a Dodge Cummins Diesel and lots of horses". Dream small the kid don't. She'll have to beat what her old man did. I got 30 acres, two calves and a 67 Ford.

When Charlie was 10, I taught her to shoot. And that includes gun safty too! When she was about 13 or 14, she decided she wanted to go deer hunting. I had told her that if she wanted to go, I would buy her a deer rifle. So we went down to the hardware store and I told her to pick out the one she wanted. I figured she would pick a 30-30 or a 243. Didn't quite work out that way. She picked an SKS 30 caliber semi-automatic. I ask, "Are you sure?" Yes, that was the one she wanted. We got back home with a couple boxes of shells and some targets and she soon proved to me that she knew what she was doing. The kid can shoot! So when friends ask, "What did you buy for your daughter?", I have to say, "Why, an assualt rifle, of course".

Here is a picture which upsets me. The picture is of Becky in Charlie's pickup. What upsets me is, "Who's driving!?", and Becky actually has a look of serious thought on her face. (Notice the larriat thrown behind the seat?) I know where they are going, or where they are comming from!