I want to tell you a true story about one of the most amazing people I have ever met in my life. This person taught me a lesson I would never forget, a lesson I remind myself of every time I want to give up.
Charles Klaphake is a man from Sauk Centre, Minn., a town about 30 miles west of our school. Charles, or “Chopper,” is a dairy farmer who has spent his entire life in Sauk Centre working on his family farm, eventually starting his own just a few miles from where he grew up. You see, Chopper has never been out of state, nor has he ever been to a professional athletic event. Every single morning, every single day, he gets up at 5:30 a.m. and does chores until about noon. On Sundays, he goes over to his parents’ place and plays cards with his brothers and sisters, who are also farmers. Other than that, Chopper basically has to and does work every single day, milking at six in the morning and six at night. He has only had one day off in over 13 years, and that was only because he suffered a hernia.
When I was in high school, I worked for Chopper and experienced the type of person he was. Every morning I showed up, every time I felt like crap, every single time I did not want to be at the farm working, he was there with a smile on his face, with determination in his eyes. Every single day. Think about jobs you have had and imagine having worked at the same one for your entire life, doing the same things every single day, rain or shine, bitter cold or hot, humid summers.
This is not just about Chopper; this is about life. Every single moment, we are challenged with tough situations we do not want to experience, things we dread having to complete. However, every single day, these things will come back to us and keep coming back to us. Our exams are not going anywhere; our life is not going to just let us pass through. Every single day we must deal with things we hate. I think about Chopper and his work ethic, his charged nature to simply get things done. In life, we are going to get hit in the mouth. There are days when we do not want to get up; there are people we do not want to face.
I tell you that life will come no matter what you do; no matter how much you dislike something, as a human, you have to face it. For Chopper, the cow manure will not go anywhere. The thousands of hay bales will not magically be placed in his hayloft. We cannot control the chores that we must do in life, but we can alter the way in which we do them.
Working does not necessarily have to be just work. It can be passion, it can be commitment and it can be attitude. No matter what happens, for seniors especially, there is a door you will pass through, paths you will walk upon. It is for you to determine how you handle, react to and benefit from every single situation. No matter how miserable and tough life gets, no matter how much you want to give up, believe and understand that it is up to you and nobody else to get through the muck, to clean the manure. At the end of the day, all we have to look back upon is how we handled the moments in life when we had to define ourselves. Leave your mark and when life hits you in the stomach, hit right back.