英语美文：The Only Owl that Matters 唯一重要的猫头鹰--自己.docVIP

英语美文：The Only Owl that Matters 唯一重要的猫头鹰--自己 　　How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie pop[1]? 　　The first time I heard this during the Tootsie pop commercial[2], I was five years old. I immediately ran to the kitchen, got a Tootsie pop and began carefully counting the licks it took to get to the soft chewy[3] middle. I sat there in front of the television, tediously licking and counting. About after two hundred licks or so, I stopped. The temptation of the chewy center had proven to be too great, and I bit my way through the hard shell to the very center.[4] Besides, I already knew how many licks it took to get to the center—three. That’s how many licks it took the owl in the commercial to get to the center, so that, to me, was the right answer. 　　In high school, I had grown out of eating Tootsie pops in front of the television. By this time, I had begun to focus on more worldly things—such as keeping my grade point average decent, participating in extra-curricular activities, and preparing myself for leaving home. [5] However, while I may have stopped eating Tootsie pops, I still held steadfastly[6] to the Tootsie pop philosophy—How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie pop? To me, the answer was still always what the owl had told me—three licks. 　　In my school, Model United Nations (MUN) was the most competitive, prestigious extra-curricular. [7] Everyone sought to win the coveted Chair position, which could eventually lead to the highest, most domineering position in the entire program—the Secretary General.[8] The MUN Chairs of our school were instantly assumed to be the smartest, highest-achieving students who would be the future CEOs and politicians of the world. In my freshman year[9], I joined the program. 　　The Chair position had become the center of the Tootsie pop and my owl had become various other students. My first so-called “owl” was Eri