First Failure

I leaned my head on my hand. I stared with blank eyes in Professor Gill’s physics lecture for   ______. The drawings and lines are all complete rubbish to me. I can’t ______ it.

After considering it for a long time, I came to Professor Gill’s office to ______ her of my final decision to switch ______. She warned me that I was too far into the ______ to drop. It means that I was going to have an F for big Fat ______ on my report card!

I called the only people who could possibly make me feel ______, my parents. The phone rang and my mom answered. Finally I ______ to say “Hi, Mom”. “Honey, what is wrong?” “Mom,” I sobbed, “I’m ______ physics.”

I explained to my mom about how engineering was not what I ______. She replied that it was okay not to be ______ all of the time, and she and my dad would ______ me in whichever career (事业)path I chose. She ______ I go to the career advising center to take some career tests to give me ideas on other ______.

I followed her advice and I began my second term to become a math teacher and ______ on time three and half years later.   ______, after one year of teaching, I discovered that it wasn’t the     ______ for me either. Over my summer break, I took a part-time job at a local media center and     ______ editing was more fun than teaching.

Failing is part of learning and it’s ______ not to have your whole life ______, as long as you work hard and rise to whatever challenges you face.

John graduated from a key university and he was very good at his major. He wished to find a good job.

One day, he went to a company to ______ for a job. He got the news in a newspaper. He did some research on this company. When he was ______, everything went well. The manager asked him some questions and he answered them ______. John was very satisfied with his performances and was very ______ that he could get the job. But at that moment, the manager’s phone ______. He picked up the phone, listened and nodded. And then he turned around and said to John, “Sorry, I want to get some important ______ now. Please give me the book with the red ______ on that desk.” John looked around and found 3 books on the desk, so John went to the desk, took one book and handed it to him ______. Holding the book, the manager ______ the phone and said, “Sorry, we cannot give the job to you.” John was ______ and wondered why. The manager said, “There are three ______. First, when you came into the office room, I found that the third button on your shirt had been missing. Second, there are three books with red covers on that desk, but you didn’t ask me which one I needed and you took one ______. Third, I was answering the call. You should ______ to the desk to save time. These ______ showed you are not a careful person.” Therefore, John didn’t get the job.

We can learn a(n)______ from John’s experience. Some people don’t ______ the details in our life. But it is the details that ______. Not only should we value what we learn but also we should pay more attention to the details. Sometimes they can even ______ our success or failure. We should form the habit of being careful and learn to keep the ______ of quantity and quality. We should keep it in mind that ______ comes first, without which quantity is of no significance.

Young Mister Smith had an idea---saving money for the company by increasing prices. At the same time, Mister Smith suggested that the company sell goods of less value.

If his ___________ liked the idea, Mister Smith might be given more pay. Perhaps he might ___________ get a better job with the company.

Business had been very slow. So Mister Smith's employer thought a few minutes about the ___________. But then she shook her head. “I am ___________, Smith,” his employer said. “It just will not wash.”

Now, the ___________ of these English words should be, “It will not get clean.” Yet Mister Smith's idea did not have anything to do with making something ___________, So why did his employer say, “It will not ___________?”

Most word experts agree that “it will not wash” ___________ it will not work. Eric Partridge wrote that the saying ___________ developed in Britain in the 1800s. In nineteenth century England, the expression came to mean an undependable statement. It was ____________ mainly to describe an idea. But sometimes it was used about a(n) ____________ .

A critic once said of the ____________ Robert Browning, “He won't wash.” The critic did not mean that the poet was not a clean person. He meant that Browning's poems could not be ____________ to last.

Today, we know that judgment was ____________. Robert Browning still is considered a major poet.

Happily for the young employee Mister Smith, his employer wanted him to do well in the company. ____________ the employer “talked turkey” to him. She said, “Your idea would be unfair to our buyers. Think of another way to save money.”

A century ago, to talk turkey meant to talk pleasantly. In recent years, the saying has come to mean an attempt to teach something important.

Mister Smith thought of a better idea after his employer talked turkey to him. He was given an increase in pay. So if your idea “will not wash,” try “talking turkey” to yourself and come up with a better idea.