Every story needs a moral. Especially this one.
I just wrote the following. It is intended to be an analogy to a situation that we need not go into here, and is riddled with inside references to the situation. I thought a moral at the end would be a good way to wrap it up, but I can’t come up with a good one. Help me out and suggest a short, pithy moral!
Here’s the story:
Once upon a time, a young man from the big city who had no previous training or experience in animal husbandry or agriculture came to a remote rural area. His dad said, “Why don’t you try your hand at farming? I’ll buy you a small farm and you can run it on your spare time, since everyone knows farming doesn’t take much effort. I’m proud of you, son.”
So the young man bought some cattle for his farm. Neighbors who had farmed for centuries suggested he needed at least 50 cows to make it profitable, but he thought, “What do they know? I don’t need that many; after all, I am only running this farm on a low-priority basis.” So he bought only two head.
He planted some crops and acquired a few different animals. He knew there might be some startup problems, but didn’t ask for help because that would be a sure sign of weakness. So he kept feeding the animals, fertilizing the crops and talking to no one. His dad, who also had no farming experience, said, “Everything’s fine. Just keep on what you’re doing, son, because no one’s watching, anyway.”
Occasionally, a county agricultural agent would come by to see how this new venture was doing. Although it was obvious that something wasn’t quite right, whenever the agent offered his expert help, the man turned his back and wouldn’t talk to him or worse. Still, the agent persisted. Since the agent’s expertise was free, paid for by taxes from other farms, he couldn’t understand why he was run off the land with a shotgun whenever he came near.
After a year, the young man held a secret meeting with his neighbors. “I give up,” he said. “I have cattle, a chicken coop, and crops. But the cows won’t give milk, the hens won’t lay eggs, and the cornstalks aren’t producing any ears. And this damned county agent keeps interfering, offering me free informational classes, books and thousands of dollars in government grants."
The county agent, who was tipped off about the meeting, could keep still no longer. “Sir,” he said, “If you had only asked for my help a year earlier, I could have saved you all this grief. The reason your ‘hens’ won’t lay eggs is they are not chickens, but pigs; your ‘cornfield’ is planted with hay; and your ‘cows’ are all bulls.”
Said the young man, “Obviously you are into bestiality, and want to do horrible things to my cows, chickens and corn. I’m surprised my neighbors associate with you. Anyway, I don’t want the hassle, so I quit. If you want a farm here, do it yourself.”
The moral of this story is…?
