A LOVING SCRATCH
Peter was a worker with moderate income. His child had just started his school-life. It was Peter’s greatest ambition in life to own a car. He used to save some money every month for this purpose. He was granted a loan from the bank and could purchase a brand-new car. He drove it home and proudly showed it to his wife and child as if it was his greatest achievement in life. He carefully washed away every speck of dirt on the painted surface of the car and was enjoying its beauty when he saw that his little child was scratching on the car’s painted surface using the sharp edge of a piece of rock. He was furious. He wanted to teach the child a lesson. In a rage he sprang upon the child, grabbed the stone and shouting words of curse, hit his fore-finger with the stone many times till his anger subsided.
The child cried aloud. His mother rushed to the scene and looked at the child’s finger. It was badly wounded and broken and was bleeding profusely. The child was rushed to a hospital. The finger was examined in detail with X-ray imaging and other investigations. The surgeons lost all hope of restoring the finger as it was fractured and crushed beyond repair. The only option was to cut off the crushed finger.
The surgery was over and the child was admitted to a room in the hospital. Looking at the bandaged hand and the worried face of his father, the child innocently tried to console his father, “Don’t worry, Daddy, the finger they cut off will grow back in a few weeks, just like the nails on the fingers.” The father was so sad to hear these words that he burst into tears and embraced the child. Later, when he went home, he examined the spot on the car where his child had made the mark with a stone. He saw that it was an inscription in illegible letters- “Daddy, I love you.”
He felt extremely sorry for reacting impulsively to the child’s innocent act of affection and inflicting an irreparable injury on his tender finger.
“There is no excuse for unjustified anger; it can bring about your downfall. Wait, and be patient, and later you will be glad you did” {Sirach 1: 22 , 23}.
“If you cannot control your anger, you are as helpless as a city without walls, open to attack” {Proverbs 25: 28}.
“It is better to be patient than powerful. It is better to win control over yourself than over whole cities” {Proverbs 16: 32 }.
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© By: Dr. Resmy Shajul, Senior Resident in Medicine, Govt. Medical College
Dr. Babu Philip, Professor, Cochin University of Science & Technology, Fine Arts Avenue, Kochi-682016, Kerala, India.
This is Story No. 171 in this site. Please click ‘Older Posts’ at the bottom of a page to read previous stories and click 'Newer Posts' at the bottom of a page to read newer stories in this site. Please click on a word in the 'Story Themes' to read stories on that theme.
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