"And 'round and 'round we would go. We'd actually have that same
argument, almost always word-for-word, at least once a week. Twice a
week in the summer. Sometimes my grandfather--my father's father--would
get involved in it. My grandfather was a nice man who liked baseball,
and he would usually take my side.
"'Listen,' he'd say to my father, 'when you were a youngster, I wanted
you to be something, too. I wanted you to be a stonecutter, same as I
was when I came over from the old country.' Oh, did I mention before
that my grandfather was a stonecutter?"
"No," replied Elephant. "You just said that he was a nice man who liked
baseball."
"Okay," said Rube's shadow. "Well, my grandfather had been a
stonecutter, and had tried to persuade Dad to become one, too. 'But no!'
he would say loudly into my father's ear, 'You wouldn't listen. You
wanted to be an engineer. So you _became_ an engineer. And a darned good
one, too. Had I forced you into masonry, you would never have excelled
in the craft for which you had no love. And you would have been very
unhappy. Now Richard wants to be a baseball player. He's so determined
that nothing is going to stop him. Let's give him a chance and see what
he can do.
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