Words to live by...

May, 2000. Last minute details at the foundry get ironed out before the installation of a major bronze grouping in Bryan. I am stooping with pain from a serious back injury just inflicted while lifting the bronze girl. I spent months in rehab, and then the insurance refused to pay for any of it, making me swear off any more sculpture jobs... But the entrepreneurial, creative spirit is hard to kill.

Years ago, while visiting with a Tom Maynard, a local banker, I noticed a quotation under the glass of his desk top. After reading it, and loving it, he offered to make a copy of it for me, as I was sure I would not remember the name of the writer or be able to find the quote again. That was before the Internet. I was thrilled to find someone, who was respected, had already described my attitude to a T, and I have kept that scrap of paper for years...

I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be uncommon if I can. I seek opportunity – not security. I will refuse to be a kept citizen, to be humbled and dulled by having my state and nation look after me. I want to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed – never to be numbered among those week and timid souls who have known neither victory nor defeat. I know that happiness can come only from the inside through hard constructive work and sincere positive thinking. I know that the so-called pleasures of the moment should not be confused with a state of happiness. I know that I can get a measure of inner satisfaction from any job if I intelligently plan and courageously execute it. I know that, if I put forth every iota of strength that I possess – physical, mental, spiritual – toward the accomplishment of a worthwhile task, ere I fall exhausted by the wayside, the Unseen Hand will reach out and pull me through. Yes, I want to live dangerously, plan my procedures on the basis of calculated risks, to resolve the problems of everyday living unto a measure of inner peace. I know if I know how to do all this, I will know how to live, and if I know how to live, I will know how to die.
H. B. Zachry