Follow Your Dream

I have a friend named Monty Roberts who owns a horse ranch in San Ysidro. He has let me use his house to put on fund-raising events to raise money for youth at risk programs.

The last time I was there he introduced me by saying, "I want to tell you why I let Jack use my house. It all goes back to a story about a young man who was the son of an itinerant horse trainer who would go from stable to stable, race track to race track, farm to farm and ranch to ranch, training horses. As a result, the boy’s high school career was continually interrupted. When he was a senior, he was asked to write a paper about what he wanted to be and do when he grew up.

"That night he wrote a seven-page paper describing his goal of someday owning a horse ranch. He wrote about his dream in great detail and he even drew a diagram of a 200-acre ranch, showing the location of all the buildings, the stables and the track. Then he drew a detailed floor plan for a 4,000-square-foot house that would sit on a 200-acre dream ranch.

"He put a great deal of his heart into the project and the next day he handed it in to his teacher. Two days later he received his paper back. On the front page was a large red F with a note that read, `See me after class.’

"The boy with the dream went to see the teacher after class and asked, `Why did I receive an F?’

追隨夢想

我有個朋友叫蒙提·羅伯茲，他在圣思多羅(San Ysidro)有座牧馬場。我常借用他寬敞的住宅舉辦募款活動，以便為幫助青少年的計劃籌備基金。

上次活動時，他在致辭中提到："我讓杰克借用住宅是有原因的。這故事跟一個小男孩有關，他的父親是位馬術師，他從小就必須跟著父親東奔西波，男孩的求學過程并不順利。初中時，有次老師叫全班同學寫報告，題目是長大后的志愿。

"那晚他洋洋灑灑寫了7張紙，描述他的偉大志愿，那就是想擁有一座屬于自己的牧馬農場，并且仔細畫了一張200畝農場的設計圖，上面標有馬廄、跑道等的位置，然后在這一大片農場中央，還要建造一棟占地4000平方英尺的巨宅。

"他花了好大心血把報告完成，第二天交給了老師。兩天后他拿回了報告，第一頁上打了一個又紅又大的F，旁邊還寫了一行字：下課后來見我。

"腦中充滿幻想的他下課后帶著報告去找老師：’為什么給我不及格?’