Our stories are
Stories of Overcoming
A trade we would make again.
A young Marine veteran’s dad shows up at the farm, alone. His son’s life is falling apart. He recently divorced and moved back home. Now he drinks beer and plays video games all night and sleeps through the day. “Can you help him?”
“I don’t know,” Mike says. “See if he’ll come to the farm.”
See if he'll come to the farm.
The veteran comes to spend the afternoon a few days later. By the time he leaves, he’s traded his Xbox for the two nanny goats Mike just bought. The goats, he’s explained, must be milked without fail at 6 a.m. and 6 p.m.
With his dad’s help, the young man builds a pen for the goats right outside his bedroom window. If he’s late to milk them, they’ll remind him. Loudly.
Mike, meanwhile, has no use for an Xbox so he calls the veteran’s dad to ask what to do with it. “I’ll come take care of it,” dad says.
This destroyed my son's life. But it was the only thing he had so I couldn't take it from him.
When Mike hands over the Xbox, dad sets it in the driveway and begins stomping it with such force that it’s soon a pile of plastic and metal. “This destroyed my son’s life,” he says. “But it was the only thing he had so I couldn’t take it from him.”
