Getting Our Attention: Is It Too Late?

There is a threadbare story that I tired of hearing years ago. It had too much of the smell of musty homespun about it to appeal to me and many of my generation, but it made a point. The story had to do with a crusty farmer and his mule. A friend observed that before they left for the fields for a day of plowing or cultivating, the farmer picked up a length of wooden 2x4 and delivered a sharp b