Opa's Rhyme

Word spread on the playground; a dodgeball battle between the bullies and the brains at noon.

The boys mapped out a survival strategy that one of them had obviously been thinking about for some time. It was a high-risk, high-reward plan that would lead to either great success or spectacular failure.

Opa, Jake's grandfather and one of the original officers of the legendary Sea Bees of the US Navy, often talked about his admiration of those unafraid of public failures. "I applaud spectacular failures!" he would say. "Without those failures, or the risk of them," he insisted, "there would never be amazing successes. Only those confident enough to endure the potential of a spectacular failure would become a great success."

Either way, it would likely end their bully problems for good.