THE MOUSE STORY

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package.

“What food might this contain?” The mouse wondered – he was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap.

Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning. “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, “Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it.”

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The pig sympathized, but said, “I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers.”

The mouse turned to the cow and said, “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The cow said, “Wow, Mr. Mouse. I’m sorry for you, but it’s no skin off my nose.”

So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer’s mousetrap – alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house – like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught.

The snake bit the farmer’s wife.

The farmer rushed her to the hospital and she returned home with a fever.

Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient.

But his wife’s sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig.

The farmer’s wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for her funeral the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.

The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness.

So, the next time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn’t concern you, remember – when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk. We are all involved in this journey called life. We must keep an eye out for one another and make an extra effort to encourage one another.

LIFE AS A COFFEE

A group of alumni, highly established in their careers, got together to visit their old university professor. The conversation soon turned into complaints about stress in work and in life. Offering his guests coffee, the professor went to the kitchen and returned with a large pot of coffee and an assortment of cups - porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, some exquisite - telling them to help themselves to the coffee.



When all the students had a cup of coffee in hand, the professor said:



"If you noticed, all the nice looking expensive cups were taken up, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress.



"What all of you really wanted was coffee, not the cup, but you consciously went for the best cups and were eyeing each other's cups.



Now consider this: Life is the coffee and the jobs, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain Life, and do not change the quality of Life. Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the coffee God has provided. So, don't let the cups drive

you - enjoy the coffee instead."

THE MISER & HIS GOLD

Once upon a time there was a Miser who used to hide his gold at the foot of a tree in his garden; but every week he used to go and dig it up and gloat over his gains.





A robber, who had noticed this, went and dug up the gold and decamped with it. When the Miser next came to gloat over his treasures, he found nothing but the empty hole.





He tore his hair, and raised such an outcry that all the neighbours came around him, and he told them how he used to come and visit his gold. "Did you ever take any of it out?" asked one of them.



"Nay," said he, "I only came to look at it."



"Then come again and look at the hole," said a neighbour; "it will do you just as

much good."



Wealth unused might as well not exist.

LIFE LESSONS

The Gold Box



Some time ago, a friend of mine punished his 3-year-old daughter for

wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight, and he became

infuriated when the child tried to decorate a box to put under the tree.

Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the  next

morning and said, "This is for you, Daddy."

He was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction, but his anger flared

again when he found that the box was empty. He yelled at her, "Don't you

know that when you give someone a present, there's supposed to be

something inside of it?"

The little girl looked up at him with tears in her eyes and said,

"Oh,

Daddy, it's not empty. I blew kisses into the box. All for you, Daddy."

The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little girl, and he

begged her forgiveness.

My friend told me that he kept that gold box by his bed for years.

Whenever he was discouraged, he would take out an imaginary kiss and

remember the love of the child who had put it there.



In a very real sense, each of us as parents has been given a gold

container filled with unconditional love and kisses from our children.

There is no more precious possession anyone could hold.

_______________________________________



"The Most Caring Child"



Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once talked about a contest he was

asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most caring child.

The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbor was an

elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry,

the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap,

and just sat there.

When his mother asked him what he had said to the neighbor, the  little

boy said, "Nothing, I just helped him cry."

___________________________________



"What It Means to Be Adopted"



Teacher Debbie Moon's first graders were discussing a picture of a  family.

One little boy in the picture had a different color hair than the other

family members. One child suggested that he was adopted and a little girl

named Jocelynn said, "I know all about adoptions because I was adopted."

"What does it mean to be adopted?" asked another child.

"It means," said Jocelynn, "that you grew in your mommy's heart   instead

of her tummy."

________________________________________________



Discouraged?



As I was driving home from work one day, I stopped to watch a local

Little League baseball game that was being played in a park near my home. As

I sat down behind the bench on the first-baseline, I asked one of the boys

what the score was.

"We're behind 14 to nothing," he answered with a smile.

"Really," I said. "I have to say you don't look very discouraged."

"Discouraged?" the boy asked with a puzzled look on his face. "Why

should we be discouraged? We haven't been up to bat yet."

__________________________________________



Roles And How We Play Them



Whenever I'm disappointed with my spot in my life, I stop and think

about little Jamie Scott. Jamie was trying out for a part in a school play.

His mother told me that he'd set his heart on being in it, though she  feared

he would not be chosen.

On the day the parts were awarded, I went with her to collect him

after school. Jamie rushed up to her, eyes shining with pride and excitement.

"Guess what Mom," he shouted, and then he said those words that will

remain a lesson to me:

I've been chosen to clap and cheer!"