A Soulful Journey

In The Crying Game, a doomed British solider tells his IRA captor the story of the frog and the scorpion.  The scorpion asks the frog for a ride across the river but the frog refuses.  "You'll sting me and I will die," he says.  "That doesn't make sense," argues the scorpion, "because I can't swim and if I kill you I'll die too."  The frog thought about it and decided it made sense so he agreed.  But halfway across the frog felt that sharp stab of the scorpion's tale.  "Why?  Why?" he gasped with his last breath.  "It's my nature, "responded the scorpion. Seek good. Do good. But be wise, beware the scorpion.

As you read the following story, as yourself: Is this a good story or bad one? Russell Baker decided this would be a "good idea" spring.  It was a time of love, crocuses, life, and planting.  He put in a fish pond in his back yard.  Russell sat and watched as his 12 fish swam lazily around.  He passed nay evening like that.  About a week later the water beams dark so he put in a filter.  Again, he sat and watched as the fish turned lazily about.  He fed them and watched their mouths pucker and such in mouthfuls of food.  About a week passed before the water began to grow cloudy again.  So Russell brought a frog to his pond.  The frog spat water and was a lovely fountain.  The frog sat on top of a brick.  It looked real and spat rings of water into the fish pond.  But mosquitoes gathered so Russell sprayed.  Then the frog turned a dark chartreuse.  It looked diseased.  So Russell bought water lilies and the ...

Did it ever happen to you that things were going well until you decided to let everyone know how smart you were and thereby ruined everything? Pride can be treacherous. Bragging can be very destructive. A Mongolian folktale about a frog goes like this: Two geese were getting ready for their flight south for the winter when they were interrupted by a frog. The frog asked the geese to take him a long. One of the geese agreed but only if the frog could figure a way for them to carry him. The frog thought and then produced a long reed of grass that the geese would hold in their beaks while the frog held tight to the middle of the reed with his mouth. They flew their way southward when the threesome was noticed by a group of men on the ground. The men stared and remarked how wonderful a device of conveyance this was and who was clever enough to devise it. That is when the proud frog opened his mouth to declared that he invented it. But when the frog spoke he lost his grip on the ...