So many people react according to how they are treated. This is especially true in families but in nearly all spheres of life. Maybe the story of Johnny Lingo will help to bring the truth of this home.
Johnny Lingo and the 8 Cow Wife is a fictional story by Patricia McGeir.
On an island in the Pacific lived a woman name Sarita (Mahana) who all the other Islanders agreed was quite plain and lacked any of the social graces expected of women on this island. She was (in the eyes of the Islanders and even her own father) not likely to marry because she was a woman without worth.
Then one day a man named Johnny Lingo appeared and offered her father the unheard sum of 8 cows to marry Sarita. The Islanders were shocked because no one had ever paid more than 5 or 6 cows for a wife – not even for the most valuable women of the island!
Sarita’s father started the bargain for Sarita at 3 cows. Johnny, however, insisted on paying the 8 cows and took his new wife home to his own island.
Months later a visitor to the islands heard the story of Johnny Lingo and his 8 cow wife and decided to visit the couple to find out why Johnny would pay such a high price for a woman viewed as having little or no value. To his surprise, he met Sarita and found her to be stunningly beautiful and one of the most graceful women he had ever seen.
Confused, he asked Johnny why his wife seemed to be so different than the other island woman had described to him. Johnny’s answer was simple: the change was because she was an 8 cow wife now.
Johnny didn’t want a 6 cow wife. So he bought one for 8 cows, treated her as an 8 cow wife and eventually she became an 8 cow wife.
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