April 3, 2007

  • An associate of mine wrote the following in a card for me:

    "Bobby,

    A great deal of the joy of life consists in doing perfectly, or at least to the best of one's ability, everything which [one] attemps to do. There is a sense of satisfaction, a pride in surveying such a work - a work which is rounded, full, exact, complete in all its parts - which the superficial man, who leaves his work in a slovenly, slipshod, half-finished condition, can never know. It is this conscientious completeness which turns work into art. The smallest thing well done, becomes artistic.

    Thank you for all your hard work."

    I felt that they could not have written this themselves and found that it is quoted from William Mathews in Elbert Hubbard's Scrapbook. New York, NY: Wm. W. Wise & Co., 1932, p. 19.

    Despite the fact that it was not original, the idea that it was put to paper and given to me is still flattering. I do take such care in my work that it is my art. If we all just did that, we each would have so much to be proud of.