A letter from Papaw — Sunday evening. Long day, slow finish.

Listen to me, because I'm only going to say it the once.

You don't sit a boy down and teach him a thing worth knowing. You just close a trunk soft when he's watching, and thirty years later he closes a trunk soft and couldn't tell you why.

That's the whole of it. The man at the hardware counter carrying birdseed out to an old woman's Buick this morning — his daddy never gave him a speech about it. His daddy just did it, where the boy could see.

Wendell whistled the same tune walking down to the creek every time we went, didn't know he was doing it. I whistle it now and don't know I'm doing it either. His tackle box is still in the corner of the shed. I haven't moved it in forty-eight years. Couldn't tell you why I haven't, but I expect somebody's watching that too.

So shut up. Close the trunk soft. The boy's looking.

Going to go put a can of oil on the porch. Earl's coming by tomorrow and won't ask for it.

Love,