Assignment 19 - Lindsey Angel

For this assignment, I guess I'm breaking the rules. The prompt asks, "What is the one piece of advice given to you that has stuck?". Well, I believe that actions speak louder than words. So as for the "advice" that has stuck with me and greatly affected how I live my life, I'd say it would have to be how my grandfather lived. I say lived, because he passed away in 2010 from stage four lung cancer. Anyway, my grandfather was not an educated man; I'm not sure he even finished high school to be completely honest, but that could just be my memory failing me. He couldn't give me a piece of advice so eloquently spoken that the words reverberated in my mind, haunting me to this day, as this prompt suggests. Yet, he spoke through his actions: the way he lived, the way he loved, the way he worked. He was the strongest man I have ever known. He wasn't a particularly large man, but he could out work any man. He worked for his family, so he could give them a better life than the one he had growing up (he was raised extremely poor, going to bed hungry most nights). Even after his retirement, he never quit working. He was always the first person to offer a helping hand. He taught me the true meaning of hard work: to work for yourself and your family, never giving up, and never tiring. To this day, the way he lived his life continues to affect how I try to live mine.