How To Grow Pinocchio

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

HE was a little 4 year old boy. His father and mother were ordinary people, without any special claims to life, but with a great mutual desire to live like everyone else.

He looked at the world with huge blue eyes and was amazed at everything that was happening around. He was delighted with a cup with a broken handle, and the hammer forgotten by his father on the nightstand caused imaginary battle scenes of battles, the loud yard cat turned into a fabulous cat in boots, and the alarm on the neighbor's car seemed to call for a trip to the magical world of Harry Potter.

At the moments when he was put aside alone, it seemed to him that the whole apartment, cluttered with furniture, was a closet of an old castle, that he was a prisoner of a winged monster and he would certainly have to fight him in order to free the rest of the captives. And then everything in the room acquired magical power: my mother's skirt was an invisible cloak, my father's tie was a saving rope, and the forbidden scissors were a terrible weapon against the monster. He fought desperately and believed that he would definitely win.

Mom, returning from the store, always scolded him for the scattered toys and things, threatened to tell his father everything and punished him for an hour with her silence, tightly closing the kitchen door behind her. He was upset, angry with his mother for the destroyed world of his fairy tale and was afraid of her betrayal. Alone He sat by the window, holding back tears with the last of his strength. Now he wanted to run through the blooming field in his grandmother's village, splash in a river with greenish-muddy water, swing his legs, sitting on a bench with the guys, thinking over another plan to take the impregnable fortress of an abandoned house.

-Men do not cry, every time his parents told him when he wanted to cry.

-You are a slobber and a rag, mother's son, - continued the father, when the boy's face twisted from approaching tears.

And then I wanted not just to cry, but to cry uncontrollably from resentment, loneliness and injustice.

“It’s not true, I’m a man, I’m a real man, I’m just offended that you don’t understand me, that you don’t hear and don’t see me,” He shouted in response to his parents, choking on tears. True, these words did not sound, but ran like crazy titles in his head.

The father was even more angry, and, without holding back the impulse, put his hand. Then the whole story ended in a dark toilet. He was sent there to think about his behavior, and after that he was also forced to ask forgiveness from his mother, for her headache and from her father, for the failed opportunity to retire at the computer.

At a party every now and then, my mother pulled back:

- You can't take other people's toys!

- You can't start eating until all the guests have sat down!

- You can't take meat with your hands!

- It’s impossible, ugly, it’s not supposed to, they don’t do that, it’s indecent, shame on you, leave it, don’t touch it, don’t go ….

He was forced to say thank you to his fat aunt for the tasteless candy, recite a long verse for all those present, help clean up dirty dishes, play with the owners' boring daughter. All this was done with an incredible effort of will. He all expected that the next request would be the last, and he would finally be able to hold in his hands an incredibly beautiful wooden boat with real sails, which stood in the bedroom on a shelf for books.

On the smiling faces of the guests, he saw boredom, weariness and hypocrisy. But everyone was touched by the sweet boy, listened to my mother's untrue stories about his diligence, perseverance and praised my mother for her extraordinary pedagogical talent.

As time passed, the little boy grew up. Now he worked as a financier in a large trading company, earning good money and rapidly moving up the career ladder. They pinned great hopes on him, listened to his opinion at meetings, and often sent him on business trips to training programs.

He learned to achieve the intended goal, to achieve the desired result, to be better, to be noticed, recognized, respected. He learned to do everything for which, as it seemed to him, one could love.

One day he finally stopped seeing himself, forgot how to feel and want something. His life was like an endless marathon. How else? - he would answer in bewilderment if you asked him why he needs all this. He would consider you an eccentric and would not shake hands at the next meeting.

Now he himself was growing up a little daughter. Now she set off on distant voyages, which ended with mooring in a dark toilet….