“I do get scared, but I know how to keep my wits with me. When you get in a real jam that’s how you survive.” He faked a quick jab at my stomach and messed up my already frazzled hair. “It takes a little practice, but just remember a couple things: You’ve got to test yourself every day, and if you live through it, it makes you stronger!” He stretched his arms up and brought them down in a mocking flex. “Rrrhhaaa! Don’t you feel stronger for just doing something that almost nobody in the whole world would dare to do?”

“I only did it because you made me.”

“Well somebody had to.” We walked in silence for a minute. “Remember when Tractor was a puppy she was afraid of the water?” he said.

“Ya, until that day we forgot her on the other side of the river.”

“That’s right I didn’t want to go back over and get her so we just kept calling her and started walking off. She whimpered for a long time, then what happened?”

“Finally she jumped in and ever since then she loves to swim.”

“And that’s just like you. Ya see, I was born already knowing what can hurt me and what can’t, but you and Tractor have to learn the hard way.”

That’s how Carter taught me things. I was almost twelve then, and he had just turned fifteen. When I was seven he locked me in the root cellar when the old potatoes had grown long eyes to get me over my fear of the dark. There were many times when he would drag me thrashing into the deep part of the swimming hole and threaten to dunk me. At nine he made me climb in front of him up a thirty-foot rock pillar called Pulpit Rock. At the top we sat on the six-foot across boulder. He calmly ate lunch. I couldn’t swallow my sandwich. He had hold on to me while I peed over the edge. Many times he would have me sit on the handlebars of his bike. He would let go and cover my eyes, or pedal straight at posts and parked cars then swerve at the last possible moment.

People seem to think that such a childhood would leave somebody deeply scarred and disturbed…maybe it did, but I think that it only gave me scars with good stories, and it only disturbs me that more people have not experienced something similar. This modern age we live in is such a mind-boggling playground and learning ground that if I never experience boredom I will not be in the least surprised. No, I never thought of hating Carter, like most people I meet here say they would. I love my brother. He helped me learn how to survive.

The more I talk to people here at college, the more I can tell that they don’t know very much about real physical life like that. They seem to only know about things like what the coolest band is, how to be hip, and where the best party is going to be. When I ask them how that helps them build their life, they just tell me to lighten up. Their way just don’t seem real to me. They look at life through some mysterious confusing haze that keeps them from exploring much further than a few steps outside the doors. And even when they’re outside their attention is stuck on things indoors. They must be so used to being told what to do that they don’t know how to just make up their own life. They seem to somehow believe that their actions have little consequence on their life, or that everything is planned and prepared for them and they just have to follow the herd; like the cattle Carter and I throw hay off the back of the truck for.

My grandpa always told Carter and me, ‘ya live an’ learn, or ya don’t live long.’ To add to that I’d say, “Ya live to learn, or long life ain’t worth dyin’ for.”