Filled with a cast of lovable, quirky characters, punctuated with simple wonders, the everyday truths found in this book offer much needed clarity to our own befuddled world. No matter where you live, no matter what your season, come along for the journey. When Philip Gulley began writing newsletter essays for the twelve members of his Quaker meeting in Indiana, he had no idea one of them would find its way to radio commentator Paul Harvey Jr. and be read on the air to 24 million people. Fourteen books later, with more than a million books in print, Gulley still entertains as well as inspires from his small-town front porch. Filled with a cast of lovable, quirky characters, punctuated with simple wonders, the everyday truths found in this book offer much needed clarity to our own befuddled world. No matter where you live, no matter what your season, come along for the journey. When Philip Gulley began writing newsletter essays for the twelve members of his Quaker meeting in Indiana, he had no idea one of them would find its way to radio commentator Paul Harvey Jr. and be read on the air to 24 million people. Fourteen books later, with more than a million books in print, Gulley still entertains as well as inspires from his small-town front porch. Philip Gulley is a Quaker minister, writer, husband, and father. He is the bestselling author of Front Porch Tales , the acclaimed Harmony series, and is coauthor of If Grace Is True and If God Is Love . Gulley lives with his wife and two sons in Indiana, and is a frequent speaker at churches, colleges, and retreat centers across the country. For Everything a Season Simple Musings on Living Well By Philip Gulley HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Copyright © 2007 Philip Gulley All right reserved. ISBN: 9780061252181 Chapter One A Time to Be Born Birth Stories I was born deep in the winter. Each birthday my father phones to recount the events surrounding my birth. Our sons are asleep in their bedroom under the eaves. My wife and I are sitting in front of the fireplace; she is doing her needlework and I am reading a mystery. The phone rings. I ease out of my chair, walk to the kitchen, pick up the phone and say, "Hello." It is my father. No "Hello." No "How are you?" Just the same question each birthday: "Have I ever told you what happened the night you were born?" "I don't believe so," I tell him. "Well, it was eight o'clock in the evening when your mother went into labor. I remember the time because Gunsmoke was just starting. There was a terrible snowstorm. We could barely see the neighbor's house for the snow. We got in the car to drive to the hospital in the city. Our defroster didn't work, and I couldn't see through the windshield. I had to drive the whole twenty miles with my head out the window. It was so cold my face was frostbitten. I ran a red light and a policeman pulled me over and said he was going to give me a ticket. I told him to hurry up because my wife was going to have a baby. The policeman said, ?Follow me!' and he turned on his lights and siren and off we went, all the way to the hospital where you were born. You had a police escort to the hospital. Not everyone can say that. That makes you special." When I was a child, my mother would tuck me into bed, kiss my forehead, then leave the room. My father would come in and sit at the foot of my bed and ask, "Say, have I ever told you what happened the night you were born?" "I don't believe so," I would tell him. He would lean back, close his eyes, and conjure up that memory'the snow and the swirling red lights and the siren's wail. I've heard that story nearly forty times and I never tire of it. Every year I wonder the same things: Will they make it in time? Will I be all right? Of course I will be, because here I am. But the way my father tells the story leaves the outcome in doubt and I never quite relax until the story concludes with me safely delivered. In my teenage years, when my father and I were at odds, I would remember how he suffered frostbite to bring me safely into this world?and my heart would soften. I was a skinny child, the target of bullies. When beaten up and ridiculed, I would take comfort in the fact that I was ushered into this world with a police escort and they were not. It was a wonderful gift my father gave me, that story. He could not give me wealth or fame to ease my way, so he gave me that story and it provided a deep consolation. My chief regret is that I am not able to offer my sons a similar story. Their births were routine, insofar as a child's birth is ever routine. We had sufficient time to drive to the hospital. The roads were clear. The car ran smoothly. My wife was unruffled. The doctors and nurses were competent and our children were delivered with a minimum of pain. I didn't feel a thing. When my older son turned five years old, he asked me, "Daddy, what happened when I was born?" I didn't want to tell him the truth'that as birth