Meaning of Love

Its after quite a few days that I am back to jotting down something here. I guess I didnt come across anything meaningful or anything worth finding the meaning in anything! Sometimes, we just need a break from everything that we do I guess !

Today I came across this video which has a story to tell …which is as below -

The scene is in the backyard of an old house. In the middle of the yard is a simple bench. Two men, a father and his son, are sitting together on a bench. They are silent. The son is reading a newspaper, turned slightly away from his dad. His father is sitting in the middle of the bench, looking ahead, hands in lap. The silence continues.

A bird lands in a nearby bush. Dad looks at the bird; his son continues reading the paper.

“What is that?” asks dad.

The son looks up. “A sparrow,” he replies, and continues reading the paper.

A little later, the bird lands on the lawn in front of dad. Dad sits up, looking at the bird.

“What is that?” asks dad.

“I just told you, father, a sparrow,” replies the son, with a little annoyance.

They sit in silence. The dad sees the bird again, and asks, “What is that?”

His son becomes very angry, drops his paper and yells, “A SPARROW, A SPARROW, S – P – A – R – R – O – W!! (spelling it). WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS? I TOLD YOU SO MANY TIMES, IT’S A SPARROW!!!

His dad stand up and turns away. “Where are you going?” asks the son. His dad does not speak, but motions with his hand for his son to stay there. Dad goes into the house.

The son remains sitting on the bench, somewhat slumped over, looking glum. Dad returns, sits in the middle of the bench right beside his son. He has a book. He opens the book, flips through a few pages, and hands the book to his son. He does not say anything, but pulls his son’s hand up, indicating his son should hold the book. Dad taps a place in the book, and says, “Loud.”

The son reads:

“Today, my youngest son, who a few days ago, turned 3, was sitting with me at the park, when a sparrow sat in front of me.

My son asked me 21 times what it was and I answered 21 times that it was a sparrow. I hugged him every single time he asked me the same question, again and again, without getting mad, feeling affection for my innocent little boy.”

Dad nods. He remembers what happened many years before. There is a pause. Then the son extends his arm around dad, holds him and kisses him on the side of his head, many times. He continues to hold his dad. The words he read have re-awakened the admiration, the appreciation and the love he feels for his dad.

Up in the tree above them, the sparrow looks down at the men below and then happily flutters away.

The takeaway from the story…

Well, we often forget the love and patience our parents showed towards us during the times we were growing up! And as life cycle treats us, we grow up from a child to an adult and go back to being a child!

But again, come to think of ….we treat our children with so much patience and love because we know they are innocent and they are inquisitive! They are seeing things in this world for the first time! But that is not the case with our parents! Its not that they are naive or they are inquisitive….they just want to test our love and patience! I mean …in this video…one can clearly see that the old man is not suffering from any physical or mental disability, so why does he keep repeating the same question again and again? Wouldn’t we get irritated if any sane adult asked us the same thing repeatedly, in spite of having answered the question??

So what is expected of us? Was that just to test if we treat them the same way they treated us when we were kids? Or was it to test if we are good human being enough to have answer to anything that anybody asks…

I really am lost….