What’s Your Carrot?

Life Lesson #282: Sometimes all you need to get better is to actually see that better exists somewhere tangible.

Dad: “You know when you’re an Olympic runner up and you’ve been practicing your whole life only to get an injury warming up for the tournament? That’s how I feel.”

Me: “At least your runner up is not a donkey and your medal is not a carrot. I don’t want to be the donkey that keeps chasing the carrot, what if the day I get it I find out that I don’t like carrots?”

Dad: “Then you’ll have to learn not to be one, hunnie. You can start doing that by not asking winning advice of a just declared Olympic eliminee.”

Life Lesson #283: Sometimes, tangible is not enough. You can always smell the carrot dangling two inches away from your nose only to find out that it might only be given to you if you buckle for budgetary cut backs just to keep you going for a couple more miles. And what’s a medal on a wall if you’re looking at it from your wheelchair 40 years later? It might even make you feel worse just for having seen better.

Dad: “Your metaphors suck.”

Me: “And yours are too depressing.”

Dad: “I know who's the donkey, but what’s the carrot?”

Me: “I don’t wanna talk about it. And i definitely can't see any athletes in this room, your..punchline is blocking my view. What’s the medal?”

Dad: “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

Me: “The only problem here is that your medal comes with the knowledge that you’ve already tried and failed towards something that’s certified. My carrot might as well be a mirage that never was and might never be.”

Dad: “Sometimes, not knowing all there is about something makes it much easier to believe in.”

Life Lesson #284: Carrots and medals are for people who need a more tangible excuse than the rush.

Life Lesson #285: But then again, most life-changing events were blamed upon a rush of blood to the head.