The Charm Bracelet, The Callus

During coffee break at the clothes factory, one's well-manicured fingers stroked the charms dangling from her bracelet -- the other's fingers rubbed a callus.
"My lucky bracelet will get me a promotion, and someday I'll run my own factory!" the first woman boasted.
The second woman had no money for even a manicure, let alone a charm bracelet. She'd saved her cash and invested it. She considered her lucky charm the callus acquired on her sewing hand from years of working overtime and over lunch breaks to make more money.
The woman with the charm bracelet often gossiped about the second woman.
"She's crude, with no charm! And look at her hand!"
But, since the second woman never spent much time on her coffee break or at the water cooler listening to idle gossip, she heard little of these insults, nor cared to.
Instead, she taught other industrious workers how to maximize their pay by sewing clothes in less time.
One day the foreman halted shop production and assembled the workers.
He turned to the woman with the callused hand, and said, "I am retiring, but I've watched your hard work, and the way you train the others. You will be our new shop foreman."
Then the retiring foreman turned to the first woman and said, "I've also seen your work, and heard your gossip and insults about those who've worked harder and saved their money."
He glanced down at the charm bracelet tinkling above her now sweaty, wringing hands.
"I hope your lucky charm is worth some cash. You're fired."
Thus, effort is rewarded more than luck.

September 20, 2014, excerpt from The Parables of Reason © 2007-2014 (Chapter 1, "Reality's Acceptance"), by Frank H. Burton, Executive Director, The Circle of Reason

Aphorism of the Week

To harm from faith is evil.

Dedicated to the Flood Wall Street protesters, and in admonishment of capitalists' refusal to accept the reality that fossil fuel use is fueling runaway global warming, and their consequent refusal to see that such willful blindness endangers the survival of our civilization and our species.