| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: leaves her alone. She is far from being faded indeed, she looks
younger than ever. Her fresh colour, her robust appearance suggest
great length of life, capable of producing a second family. On
this subject I have but one document, a pretty far-reaching one,
however. There were a few mothers whose actions I had the patience
to watch, despite the wearisome minutiae of the rearing and the
slowness of the result. These abandoned their dwellings after the
departure of their young; and each went to weave a new one for
herself on the wire net-work of the cage.
They were rough-and-ready summaries, the work of a night. Two
hangings, one above the other, the upper one flat, the lower
The Life of the Spider |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber: "Young men wanted. An unusual opportunity for travel,
education, and advancement. Good pay. No expenses."
When the car turns at Eighteenth, and I see that, I remember
Eddie Houghton back home. And when I remember Eddie Houghton I see
red.
The day after Eddie Houghton finished high school he went to
work. In our town we don't take a job. We accept a position. Our
paper had it that "Edwin Houghton had accepted a position as clerk
and assistant chemist at the Kunz drugstore, where he would take up
his new duties Monday."
His new duties seemed, at first, to consist of opening the
Buttered Side Down |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Memories and Portraits by Robert Louis Stevenson: radically more contemptible than when he entered. But if I have a
flushed, blustering fellow for my opposite, bent on carrying a
point, my vanity is sure to have its ears rubbed, once at least, in
the course of the debate. He will not spare me when we differ; he
will not fear to demonstrate my folly to my face.
For many natures there is not much charm in the still, chambered
society, the circle of bland countenances, the digestive silence,
the admired remark, the flutter of affectionate approval. They
demand more atmosphere and exercise; "a gale upon their spirits,"
as our pious ancestors would phrase it; to have their wits well
breathed in an uproarious Valhalla. And I suspect that the choice,
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