THE FASTEST RUNNER
A young boy was habitually lazy and fun loving. He had a wealthy father
and took for granted, all the comforts that were available to him without
batting an eyelid. His father tried time and again to get the lad to start
working, but the fellow was just not willing to lift a finger.
One day the father got rather angry and told him, "Son, go out and do
some work and do not return till you have earned something. It may be a small
amount, but earn you must." The boy went out, but returned promptly just after
he saw his father leave for work. He came and asked his mother for some money
saying, "Look Mummy, father is being so unfair with me. You know, that I cannot
work. I'm not used to it. You have to give me some money." Mother took pity on
the apple of her eye and gave him some money. The boy spent the day loafing
around with his friends and returned home in the evening; brandishing the money
that mother had given him. "Look, Daddy, I have earned this! Isn't it a tidy
sum?"
Father looked over his spectacles at the money and said, "That's great!
Well! Go and toss it into the well!" The boy said, "What?" Father repeated, "Go
and toss it into the well." The boy gave him a confused look, but went and
tossed the money into the well, whistling merrily to himself.
The following morning, father asked him to go out and work again. The
boy repeated the same drama and ended the day by tossing mother's money into
the well. On the fifth day, mother refused to give him the money. She said, "I
cannot afford to give you money that you keep tossing into the well. I'm sorry
son, but I think you would do better to go out and actually do some work and
earn some real money." The dejected boy sulked for a while and then an idea
struck him. He went to his grandmother's house. So for the next few days,
grandma's money found its way into the well, till grandma also decided that she
could oblige him no longer.
The next two days he was able to manage with his elder sister's help,
but eventually no one seemed to sympathize with him anymore and anyways he was
too scared to tell his father that he had been hoodwinking him all these days.
Finally the day came when no one obliged him and he actually went out
to look for work. After a tiresome search he was able to find a job as a help
in a photocopy shop. By the evening he had a paltry sum of money in his tired
hands. That evening when he presented the money to his father, as usual father
said, "Go and toss it into the well!"
The boy exclaimed, "How can you say that Daddy? It's my hard earned
money. How could you even think of tossing it away? I've slogged all day to
earn it." His voice trailed off as he felt his father staring intently at him.
Father said softly, "The money that you've been tossing away all these days was
also hard earned son! I'm glad you know how hard it is to waste money, when
it's hard earned!"
