Summer with the Slug Rats
Rats
An old friend called to say he was getting back with his ex. I cringed.
I said, “They train rats to push a lever to get a food pellet. They put some of the rats on a schedule. Every so many pushes they get a reward for pushing the lever.”
“So I’m a rat,” he said.
“Other rats get rewarded randomly. They never know how many pushes before they get rewarded.”
“Still don’t like being called a rat.”
“The rats on a schedule will quit pushing the lever once they miss a couple of rewards. The other rats will keep pushing, thinking the reward must be coming soon.”
“Don’t get the point of all this rat BS,” he said
“Some people have learned stop doing what isn’t rewarding. Others keep waiting for rewards few and far between, like living for another kind word from an abusive partner.”
Silence.
I said, “A rat will die because the rare rewards don’t make up for the effort they put out pushing the lever. Please don’t be that rat.”
Today I’ll help someone not be that rat.
Summer with the Slug Rats ? 2020 by Ken Montrose
Summer with the Slug Rats is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and anyone you might know is purely coincidental.
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