This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009 at 5:58 pm and is filed under Commentary, Feelings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
I didn’t write this story, but I think about it often. Every time I tell my girls, “just a minute” or “not right now” I’m forgetting the importance of the moment and that I will never get this time back. Once the moment is gone it’s gone forever – and while there will be many more minutes and times for us to play, why waste a single one of them if I don’t have to? So for that reason alone, I am sharing this story with our readers, in hopes that it will help each of us remember the value of time.
Enjoy ~
Papa
A man came home from work late, tired and irritated, to find his 5-year old son waiting for him at the door.
‘Daddy, may I ask you a question?’
‘Yeah sure, what it is?’ replied the man.
‘Daddy, how much do you make an hour?’
‘That’s none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing?’ the man said angrily.
‘I just want to know. Please tell me, how much do you make an hour?’
‘If you must know, I make $50 an hour.’
‘Oh,’ the little boy replied, with his head down.
‘Daddy, may I please borrow $25?’
The father was furious, ‘If the only reason you asked that is so you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I don’t work hard everyday for such childish frivolities. ‘
The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door.
The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy’s questions. How dare he ask such questions only to get some money?
After about an hour or so, the man had calmed down , and started to think:
Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that $25.00 and he really didn’t ask for money very often The man went to the door of the little boy’s room and opened the door.
‘Are you asleep, son?’ He asked.
‘No daddy, I’m awake,’ replied the boy.
‘I’ve been thinking, maybe I was too hard on you earlier’ said the man. ‘It’s been a long day and I took out my aggravation on you. Here’s the $25 you asked for.’
The little boy sat straight up, smiling. ‘Oh, thank you daddy!’ he yelled. Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled up bills.
The man saw that the boy already had money, started to get angry again.
The little boy slowly counted out his money, and then looked up at his father.
‘Why do you want more money if you already have some?’ the father grumbled.
‘Because I didn’t have enough, but now I do,’ the little boy replied.
‘Daddy, I have $50 now. Can I buy an hour of your time? Please come home early tomorrow. I would like to have dinner with you.’
The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little son, and he begged for his forgiveness.
