| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Cruise of the Jasper B. by Don Marquis: A sharp metallic click overhead gave point to Loge's words.
Looking up, Cleggett saw that a trap-door had opened in the
ceiling, and through the aperture Pierre, who had left the room
some moments before with the bartender, was pointing a revolver,
which he had just cocked, at Cleggett's head. He sighted along
the barrel with an eager, anticipatory smile upon his face;
Pierre would, no doubt, have preferred to see a man boiled in oil
rather than merely shot, but shooting was something, and Pierre
evidently intended to get all the delight possible out of the
situation.
Cleggett's own pistol was within an inch of Loge's stomach.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Youth by Joseph Conrad: the pumps. And while we pumped the ship was going
from us piecemeal: the bulwarks went, the stanchions
were torn out, the ventilators smashed, the cabin-door
burst in. There was not a dry spot in the ship. She was
being gutted bit by bit. The long-boat changed, as if
by magic, into matchwood where she stood in her gripes.
I had lashed her myself, and was rather proud of my
handiwork, which had withstood so long the malice of
the sea. And we pumped. And there was no break in
the weather. The sea was white like a sheet of foam,
like a caldron of boiling milk; there was not a break in
Youth |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister: gentleman who saw the pinto and heard Honey became anxious to get up a
race. Lin always sent money for Wiggin to place, and he soon opened a
bank account, while Honey, besides his racing-bridle, bought a
silver-inlaid one, a pair of forty-dollar spurs, and a beautiful saddle
richly stamped. Every day (when in Mesa) Honey would step into the
drug-store and inquire, "Lin, wher're yu' goin'?"
But Lin never answered any more. He merely came to the soda-water
fountain with the whiskey. The passing of days brought a choked season of
fine sand and hard blazing sky. Heat rose up from the ground and hung
heavily over man and beast. Many insects sat out in the sun rattling with
joy; the little tearing river grew clear from the swollen mud, and shrank
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