I Had Gotten Up To Two, Maybe

I Started Learning My Lessons In Abbot Texas, Where I Was Born In 1933. My Sister Bobbie And I Were Raised By Our Grandparents [...] We Never Had Enough Money, And Bobbie And I Started Working At An Early Age To Help The Family Get By. That Hard Work Included Picking Cotton. [...] Picking Cotton Is Hard And Painful Work, And The Most Lasting Lesson I Learned In The Fields Was That I Didn't Want To Spend My Life Picking Cotton.

After Every Tour, I Think About Hanging Up The Touring Hat, And After A While Of Not Working, I'm Ready To Play. I Think I Enjoy Playing Music More Than I Enjoy Not Playing Music.

Americans Don't Eat Horses. They Are Not Raised As Food Animals And They Are Treated With Chemicals That Render Them Unsafe For Consumption. The Regulations Needed To Change Their Status To "food Animals" Would Cripple Every Aspect Of The Horse Industry As We Know It. Plus, It Would Be Wrong.

I Was Influenced A Lot By Those Around Me - There Was A Lot Of Singing That Went On In The Cotton Fields.

I Had Gotten Up To Two, Maybe Three, Packs (of Cigarettes) A Day. And My Lungs Were Bothering Me And I'd Had Pneumonia Two Or Three Times. And I Was Also Smoking Pot, And I Decided, Well, One Of Them's Got To Go. And So I Took A Pack Of Chesterfields And Took All The Chesterfields Out, Rolled Up 20 Big Fat Ones And Put It In There, And I Haven't Smoked A Cigarette Since Then.