30 Days to a Better Man, Day 14: write a letter to your father

Father and Son II by Ismo Hölttö. Silver gelatin print, 1966. 

The directions say write, not send. Sending is optional. As it happens, though, I already (and inadvertently) did both those things.

Late on the evening of Day 4, realizing that Day 5's task would be to "cultivate your gratitude," I decided to get a bit of early practice in. Cheating? No. This was more personal. It was something I'd had half a mind to do for ages, but had never done, and this was a perfect excuse to do it, and get the ball rolling on wholesale gratitude-cultivation in the process.

I wrote a lengthy e-mail to my parents.

Within it, in separate paragraphs, I thanked my mother and father for all they'd done for me in childhood and beyond. Each of them has taught me so much in their own inimitable way, shared their knowledge and experience with me, made sacrifices for me, and just generally done their darnedest to make my life as easy and comfortable and interesting as possible. So I took the time to thank them properly for it. Separately. Individually. Respectively.

Cheating? No. Their paragraphs were as long as a single-page letter would have been. The only difference was that it was electronic instead of written by hand on wood pulp. But it's the thought that counts, right?

I spent all day in Itaewon and Yangcheon-gu, picking up brewing supplies and bottling an American pale ale. I was especially grateful to ol' Dad today, as the book he sent me for Christmas — How to Brew by John J. Palmer — came in dang handy. It should prove useful for the porter the boys and I are brewing next week — the last beer we'll craft before I jet off to Hokkaido in early February.

But that's a story for another day. Not Day 15, though. That's tomorrow.