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Too late at eighteen? Sad words. They are growing up old and set in their ways. They have been told to prepare for one career and to stick to it and succeed. They are not told that they have a right to try many paths, to stumble and try something else, and to learn by stumbling. The right to fail is one of the few freedoms not granted in our Bill of Rights. Today it is more acceptable to change marriage partners than to change careers.
18岁就太晚了？真是令人伤心的话。他们的行为方式正变得陈旧呆板。一直有人告诉他们要为某一种职业作准备，要坚持不懈直至成功。没有人告诉他们，他们有权尝试多种道路，跌倒后再试试别的途径，在跌跌撞撞中学习。失败的权利是我们的《人权法案》没有授予我们的少数几项自由之一。如今，更换配偶比更换职业更易被人接受。
"Victory has very narrow meanings and can become a destructive force," writes Bill Bradley in his book, Life on the Run. Bradley was an Ivy Leaguer himself and a Rhodes Scholar — an earlier member of the same elite that is now so preoccupied with success — before starting histen-year career of professional basketball, which has just come to an end. "The taste of defeat," he writes, "has a richness of experience all its own. To me, every day is a struggle tostay in touch with life's subtleties. No one grows without failing."
“胜利具有十分狭隘的意义，它能成为一种破坏力，”比尔·布雷德利在他的《奔忙的人生》一书中写道。布雷德利本人在开始其刚刚结束的十年职业篮球生涯之前是长春藤联合会名牌大学的学生，罗兹奖学金获得者——如今正忙于追求成功的精英族的早期一员。“失败的滋味，”他写道，“其本身蕴含着十分丰富的体验。对我而言，每天都是一场为一刻不脱离生活奥妙而进行的斗争。没有人在成长过程中不经历失败。”
The fault is not with our children, but with the narrowness of the flowerbed in which we expect them to germinate. We are stunting their growth if we tell them that there is only one "right" way to get through their education or to get through life. America has always been nourished by men and women who are not afraid to go against the grain.
过错不在我们的孩子们，而在我们期待他们在其中发芽成长的花坛过于狭小。如果我们告诉他们完成教育或度过人生的“正确”道路只有一条，那我们就是在阻碍他们的生长。美国的繁荣始终得益于不怕离经叛道的男女志士。
