I know that you should save the best for last. I think though that I will begin with one of the best. This is a story that I occasionally share with certain people, at particularly difficult times in their life. This story can be read different ways by different people. What this talks about though is social perception and personal perception. This is my favorite granddaddy story. Not just because of the message, but it is a rarity to hear this story from him. Someone really needs to be in a bad state for him to tell it.

I hope you get something from it. Please feel free to share it with those people that you meet in life that need a perceptive view on life’s and the changes it brings us all.

There once was a farmer in a small town in the Dakotas. This farmer spent his life raising his precious son. You see the father was alone because his wife died giving birth to their only child, a son.

Everyone in the little mourned with and for the farmer. He was very sad and heart broken. The town’s people would say things like, “It is so bad for what has happened to your wife.” Or, “how will you get along farmer?”

That old farmer would just hold up his head and tell everyone, “What’s good, is good. Sometimes what is bad is good.” Of course the town folk just didn’t understand this but wrote it off to a farmer with a broken heart.

The years would go by. That young son of the farmer grew up to be a strong young man. He was a young man with promise, integrity, and a future in anything that he worked at. The farmer was very proud of his son. The town folk would say, “Jenny would be so proud to see her son. It is such a bad tragedy that she isn’t.”

That old farmer would just hold up his head and tell everyone, “What’s good, is good. Sometimes what is bad is good.”

Now every summer there was a live stock auction in town. Everyone would bring extra stock and it would be auctioned off. The farmer’s son was one the best stock handlers in the area. He would assist every year with the auction.

This year the farmer bought a spirited young stallion. He needed young strong stock to work the fields. He knew that he and son could handle this mean spirit.

Everyone in town was extremely shocked. The farmer had never been one to take a chance on something so wild and ferocious. Everyone would tell that farmer, “That horse is nothing but bad. He is an evil spirit that will bring bad things to you farmer.”

That old farmer would just hold up his head and tell everyone, “What’s good, is good. Sometimes what is bad is good.”

Well, that young and only son figured that he could have that ominous stallion broken in no time. The second day in the corral and that young and only son was thrown from that stallion. He landed on the gate and broken his spine.

Everyone in town felt so sad for the farmer. First, his wife dies giving birth. Now his only child is paralyzed and will have to spend his life that way. Everyone in town would say, “See farmer, we told you that stallion was nothing but bad. Look what it has gotten you now.”

That old farmer would just hold up his head, hold the tear in his eye back, and tell everyone, “What’s good, is good. Sometimes what is bad is good.”

About 10 years later along came this thing called the Vietnam Conflict. All of the young men and sons where drafted from town. They all went on to defend their country and their own little town in the name of peace and democracy. None of them came home. Everyone in town was saddened by the lose.

Then there is that old farmer swinging on the porch. In his lap he holds tightly to his paralyzed son. If you listen closely you can hear him over that squeaky old swing saying, “What’s good is good. Sometimes, what’s bad is good too.”