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Examples

A telephone conversation between Jill and Jack about John and Mary.

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[Jill's remarks are in blue; Jack's are in red.]

  1. Hi! It's an ugly day here,
  2. It's raining,
  3. More accurately, it's pouring cats and dogs.
  4. {So much for the weather,} I want to talk about John.
  5. What about John?
  6.  His grades,
  7. How bad are they?
  8. He has "D's" in three subjects and "C's" in two others."
  9. That's pretty bad.
  10. What can we do?
  11. For starters, talk to him.
  12. John is not like Mary who listens to me.
  13. John looks away when I bring up the subject of his grades.
  14. Whereas Mary looks contritely at me if I bring up a fault of hers.
  15. Recently, John has even walked away to avoid the subject of his grades.
  16. You can be sure Mary would never dare to do that.
  17. I don't think Mary is that docile.
  18. Well, the other day, Mary answered the phone and it was a telemarketer.
  19. She couldn't bring herself to hand up on him.
  20. She kept answering his questions.
  21. I could tell she wanted to end the conversation but couldn't manage it.
  22. So, I asked her for the phone.
  23. She politely said to the telemarketer, "Pardon me, just a minute, my mother wants to talk to you."
  24. I had to end the conversation for her.
  25. I said, "Sorry we are not interested in subscribing to the Courier News" and hung up
  26. But remember when Mary wanted to get on the track team and the coach told her she would be better off quitting.
  27. Ok, she didn't say anything to him right away but she showed up at the next practice.
  28. Her coach said: what are you doing here?
  29. She said: "I want to be on the team."
  30. Coach replied that "Everyone here is faster than you."
  31. "Well if that's so, let me race the fastest girl."
  32. He agreed and said if she could beat Janet Fox in a race, she could stay on the team.
  33. John went with her and remember his account of the race.
  34. John told us that Janet Fox laughed at the coaches request that she race Mary, saying "I'm the fastest runner by far; Mary's no match for me."
  35. "Mary," he said, "shouted back at Janet: We'll see who wins."
  36. "Janet shot out ahead immediately with a furious burst of speed." John continued.
  37. But she used up too much energy and had to slow down to rest and get her breath again.
  38. Mary not only caught up with her but took the lead.
  39. John said that later the coach admonished Janet for being too cocky and thinking that she could let Mary take a good lead and then catch her in the last lap.
  40. Mary persisted and just edged Janet out at the finish line.
  41. Jack, for heaven's sake, John was pulling your leg when he told that story; it's not true—Mary and Janet never raced each other.
  42. Are you sure?
  43. That's another problem with John; he tells tales and makes up stories about events that never happened.
  44. Besides, that's the old Aesop fable about the "Tortoise and the Hare."
  45. Oh, god. You're right.
  46. Why does John do these things?
  47. I think I'm beginning to understand why he told that story with Mary as the heroine.
  48. Enlighten me!
  49. It's one of the most repeated stories in the culture.
  50. It's about having the right attitude.
  51. So what?
  52. By telling us that particular story he was talking about Mary's attitude—she's not aggressive but she's persistent.
  53. How do you know that?
  54. The fable of "the Tortoise and the Hare" is a cultural configuration of persistence: that's the moral of the story, "persistence trumps aggression"—remember how cocky the hare was in the fable.
  55. I thought the moral was "Slow and stead wins the race."
  56. Exactly!
  57. I take your point Jack, Mary is very persistent.
  58. Although her plants die, she refuses to stop gardening.
  59. She just gets new ones and plants them, trying out different combinations of soil, fertilizer, sun, and temperature until they grows into healthy plants
  60. Well, I'm glad you agree but I have to admit that there are times when Mary is quite docile as you've pointed out.
  61. I almost forgot about John.
  62. I don't believe we can solve that problem over the phone.
  63. Wait until I get back from New York and we'll talk it through.
  64. You're right but we have to address the problem.
  65. Agreed.
  66. Love you!
  67. Love you too!
  68. Bye.
  69. See you tomorrow.

jjs

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last revised: September 4, 2007 Send comments to jjs.

copyright © jjs, 2007