Read the legend titled "The Little Mice." Once upon a time, a prairie mouse busied herself all fall storing away a cache of beans. Every morning she was out early with her empty cast-off snakeskin, which she filled with ground beans and dragged home with her teeth.

The little mouse had a cousin who was fond of dancing and talk but did not like to work. She was not careful to get her cache of beans, and the season was already well gone before she thought to bestir herself. When she came to realize her need, she found she had no packing bag. So she went to her hardworking cousin and said:

"Cousin, I have no beans stored for winter and the season is nearly gone. But I have no snakeskin to gather the beans in. Will you lend me one?"

"But why have you no packing bag? Where were you in the moon when the snakes cast off their skins?"

"I was here."

"What were you doing?"

"I was busy talking and dancing."

"And now you are punished," said the other. "It is always so with lazy, careless people. But I will let you have the snakeskin. And now go, and by hard work and industry, try to recover your wasted time."

What are the choices?

explanation:

the intellectual community is a place like a university where people with high marks, or original thought or an outstanding interest in something gather. they take classes together. they discuss things. they argue sometimes, and not always in a friendly way. but if they argue, it is because they are passionate about something, and there is nothing the matter with that.

lately i've been hearing rumors that it is not the way it was when i went to school. the one thing all schools used to have was free speech. the 1st amendment rights were sacred. now i'm hearing they are not. students can be reported and disciplined for giving an off the wall opinion.

that is shameful.

intellectual ideas are meant to be discussed. they are meant to be chewed up and worked on. that is the primary responsibility of every intellectual community. if that is not the way it is, then that is not a school to go to.

social media, in my opinion, and this is just an opinion. i wouldn't take it too seriously, complicates everything to do with human communication. you can want to share things and others feel they have the right to be very critical or sarcastic or mean about what you share. lack of respect is an immeasurable intolerable condition and social media abounds with that sort of thing.

one of the things i really like about is how careful people are because they must have some idea that the mods are exactly what the word says they are. they police this board very well, and what is so remarkable about them is that they are no older than the average grade 12 student.

my hat goes off to them (which means i respect them quite a bit).