It's not easy being a farmer, but it has its rewards.

"There seem to be but three ways for a nation to acquire wealth. The first is by war, as the Romans did, in plundering their conquered neighbors. This is robbery. The second by commerce, which is generally cheating. The third by agriculture, the only honest way, wherein man receives a real increase of the seed thrown into the ground, in a kind of continual miracle, wrought by the hand of God in his favor, as a reward for his innocent life and his virtuous industry."

Clearly Ben Franklin thought very highly of farmers, as it should be.

Our speaker, Mr. William Lee, is a commercial farmer; he is also an Auburn graduate, assuring us that he would not love what he does for a living had he not had such a good education. Also, coming from a farming family, he got to go home and gain valuable experience with his job. He confessed to have little interest in farming before going to Auburn but later was very glad to have farming in his family.

Mr. Lee told us about the different kinds of things he used in his job, such as tractors and a special little car used to test the soil (rights owned exclusively by Mr. Lee, seeing as he came up with it). He also explained that you don't always have to be conventional; for instance: yes, Mr. Lee is a farmer, but he is, unlike other farmers, not tilling his land as this is a much more eco-friendly thing to do because it reduced run-off. He has been implementing this type of technique for 20 years (which is not much considering how long people have been farming). This way, the land doesn't get ruined and could even be left in a better shape.

Here come the... values, I guess I'll say. These not only apply to farming but to any career.

• Go ahead and try, like Mr. Lee did with farming. It's not going to hurt, and it might even be what you want to do.
• Cotton, just as we, must have a long season. This means that our jobs, family and other things important to us take commitment in order to give them that long season.
• Be innovative, like Lee was with his little car. Make something amazing and useful out of something plain.
• Know how to identify the good and the bad part of your crops. Take care of the good and toss the bad.
• Try to achieve a good harvest. Our own harvests are our report cards, or our income later on.
• Most importantly, don't give up. There will be dry spells, floods, tornadoes... you name it. But we have to keep going.