Monday, September 1, 2014

Good Friends

Good friends are invaluable.  I am lucky to count more than a handful.  Actually, I am very blessed because "luck" is a blessing in disguise.  Maybe we need more training to identify our blessings?

I've talked about my involvement in Ohio State LEAD Class IV many times.  30 of us were selected for a two year, 60 day intensive look at leadership in agriculture.  That took us all over our state of Ohio, California and Western Europe.  It was a very rare and valuable experience for me, one that really has changed my life.

One of my classmates is a close friend and just left our place with a load of wheat on his semi tractor and trailer.  Even though he lives at the other end of the state, we have shared many valuable days together in the last 22 years.  We bounce a lot of ideas off each other.  We share our passions of no-till farming and family and a lot of other good things.

We were able to see a lot of our friends this Labor Day weekend.  Lots of us have the same concerns and are going through similar circumstances because of our age group and profession.

"In his discourse on friendship in the Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle says: "For without friends, no one would choose to live though he had all other goods. Even rich men, and those in possession of office and of dominating power are thought to need friends most of all; for what is the use of such prosperity without the opportunity of beneficence, which is exercised chiefly and in its most laudable form towards friends? Or how can prosperity be guarded and preserved without friends?" He goes on to say that: "But it is not only necessary but also noble; for we praise those who love their friends, and it is thought to be a fine thing to have many friends; and again we think it is the same people that are good men and are friends."
Have a great Labor Day with your friends, I hope you find them among your family!
Ed

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