Slow and Steady Wins the Race (Blog #39)

One of my favorite childhood stories is the story of "The Tortoise and the Hare". As I write that, it occurred to me that many of the younger generations may not even know what a "tortoise" or a "hare" is. The title seems to lose some of its meaning when you water it down to "The Turtle and the Rabbit". If we must, we must!

The basic premise of the story is a race between two of nature's creatures, a tortoise (or turtle) and a hare (or rabbit). At first, these two seem ill-matched for everyone knows that the rabbit can outpace the turtle. This race begins and the hare, as rabbits are prone to do, hops off to a big lead before the tortoise barely moves off the starting line. After awhile, the tortoise needs to refuel so stops to eat and take a nap (or something like that - you know how I like naps). Meanwhile the tortoise, who has paced himself, continues to make slow but steady progress and eventually passes the hare. When the hare realizes what has happened, he again hops off and the cycle repeats itself.

Now, this fable is intended to have a meaning for all the boys and girls who read or hear this story during their youth. The triumph comes at the end of the story when the slow but steady tortoise wins the race because the hare has expended too much energy sprinting ahead that his downfall is the need to stop and refuel frequently. When I have travelled on road trips, I have noticed this same phenomenon. The same cars pass me over and over again. Once in awhile, I pass them as they stop for fuel or food. Maybe the story of the tortoise and the hare still applies.

Looking back on this story, I can honestly thank my sixth grade teacher for tagging me with a nickname from this fable. I got the last laugh when I took a physical fitness class in college and received an "A". That was perhaps my proudest physical moment in life. Well, actually there have been others but none that made me feel better than that. In any event, slow and steady may always win the race!

Eight (8) days and eleven (11) blog posts to go...

~DB Turnmire