I remember waking at 3:00am when I was 12 years old. I was old enough by then to change the irrigation water by myself and it helped my dad out a lot as he had a full-time job. I hopped in the old farm truck and drove 8 miles to our fields in the middle of nowhere. I had to jump in a ditch with 4 feet of running water and dam it off with a tarp attached to a long wooden pole. This was 20 years ago. It seemed so normal to me and all my peers in the area. Then I went to college and realized it wasn't normal. Then I went on my mission and WOW!... I realized quickly this was the first real work a lot of kids had ever done.

The only time I ever felt I was maybe a little young was when a stack of hay collapsed on me and I was pinned under some hay bales for 5 hours until my grandpa happened to drive by. A man probably could have hefted his way out. I was 10 or 11 at the time. Stories like this seemed like no big deal where I was brought up. I would tell them on the mission and people would think they were crazy.

It's all about perspective.