Persistence as a Virtue

Persistence:
The ADF defines persistence as “the drive, motivation to pursue goals even when that pursuit is difficult.”

Virgil’s “Aeneid , the great epic of Rome’s founding, celebrates persistence. Writing of the voyages of Aeneas to find a home for his people, Virgil sought to codify the beginnings of Rome in an epic poem. However, Virgil died before finishing his “Aeneid”. Personally, I think that the “Aeneid” celebrates not only Aeneas’ persistence but Virgil’s as well.

After the Greeks destroyed Troy, Aeneas took his people on a journey find a new home. While searching, he was constantly harassed by Juno, the Queen of the Roman Gods, who bore a grudge against his mother, Venus, the Goddess of Love. While the two Goddesses sparred, Aeneas coped with the death of his father, shipwrecks, and attacks by vicious harpies. Finally, he landed in Italy, where his dead father had told him to go. However before Aeneas could settle, he has to fight the Latins and other local Italic peoples.

In my life, doing the family laundry exemplifies persistence. Every week, I have to walk two blocks to the laundry room in my complex. (Parking is not allowed in the area.) Carrying the soap and my bags, I walk in all types of weather. Furthermore, the laundry room of my complex is freezing in the winter and stifling in the summer.