One day, a man told his son never to go to the hut he built just behind the house. He never told him why. He only said it was out of bounds. John was ten. Everyday, when father headed out for the office, John would stare at the hut from the window in his room. For months, he wondered why his father didn’t want him around the hut. Thoughts ran through his mind at intervals. He thought
“Perhaps, dad is hiding something really big from me. Maybe a big secret he doesn’t want anyone to know about…” John said.
Naturally, John was curious. So one day, while dad was away at work, he took the keys to the hut from his dad’s room, exited the house and walked slowly to the hut. He stood at the entrance for a while wondering the consequences of the action he was about to take. For a moment, he was terrified at what could be his father’s reaction if he found out he opened the hut. But he was overwhelmed by the thought of what could be hidden in the hut. So he made his choice.
Slowly, he put the key into the lock and pushed the door wide open. In disbelieve, his mouth agape at what he found. He was left completely puzzled at what his eyes had seen. Then he said
“Nothing?! Really?!” John queried rather indignantly.
He found nothing in the hut. The hut was empty. It was empty the whole time. John couldn’t help but wonder why his father would make an empty hut and told him never to go there if he didn’t have something to hide. In fury, he locked the door and hobbled straight to his room. There was only one thought on his mind.
“This is ridiculous! Father has to have a good explanation for this.” John said.
So he anticipated his father’s return from work that day. At nightfall, after his father had prepared dinner, it was time to eat at the dining. While they ate, John popped the question that had been bothering him since noon-day.
“Dad?” John called.
“Yes son?” father replied.
“Erm-mm…about the hut?” John ask.
“Yeah…What about it?”
“I’m sorry dad but out of curiosity, I went in there today.” John said.
“Why John? But I told explicitly not to.” Father said, disappointed.
“I’m sorry but I just wanted to know why. To my greatest surprise, there was nothing in there. It was empty. Why? Why tell me not go in there if there was nothing to hide?”
Father sighed for a moment.
“Sorry I made you mad.” John apologised.
“It’s okay son. I’m not mad at all. As a matter of fact, this was the plan from the get go. I knew you were going to go in there.” father said.
John was a bit blimey at this point.
“What?!” he exclaimed.
“Yes John….you see…I wanted you to learn a lesson.”
“What lesson dad?”
“You…see…sometimes as humans, we think we want something so bad we could give anything to have a feel of it but then when we finally to have it, we realize it was nothing after all. The human mind is inquisitive cause it always want to know.
We want to experience everything but forget not everything has to be experienced. Most times we try to force these experiences to happen because we want to satisfy our curiosity. Son, sometimes we must learn to allow things take their natural causes.”
“So I shouldn’t be curious?” John asked, confused.
Father scoffed for a moment there to John’s question.
“Son, you really don’t have much of a choice. We’re humans, we’ll always be curious. It bores down to how we channel it.” father said.
“Wow…thanks dad. I’m sorry I went against your will opening the hut.” John apologised again.
“Sometimes we offend people to please ourselves. But the most important thing is to understand how much such persons mean to you for you to either do their will or not.”
“So…you’re not angry?” John asked, puzzled.
“Not anymore son. The fact that you feel sorry about it means you feel guilty which means you recognize you’ve made a mistake and you’re ready to take a step in the right direction. In the end, your heart’s in the right place. Sometimes that’s all we need to get on with life. We can’t turn back the hands of time but what we can do is not waste further time dwelling on mistakes than learning from them.” father ended with a smile.
“…I love you dad…I don’t know what I’d do without you.” John said embracing his father.
A lot of moral lessons to pick from that short story. It’s amazing how sometimes what we think we want is not what we really need. Then again, we’re humans and sometimes we misunderstand those concepts. In the end, it’s all about channelling either your mistakes or lessons rightly and be ready to take on whatever nature throws at you next.
Like John’s father said, we’re humans, we’ll always be curious but sometimes we have to consider the cost. And like the hut, sometimes what we’re looking for is nothing. Think about that for a minute. This is Danny world….
DANNY WORLD 