The Foolish Bear
Once there lived a big bear in the bushes where he had built his den. There
was a riverside quite far from his den.
It was a springtime when the snow was
gone, leaves started growing and all the other animals went out to different
places to look for food. But the big bear was fast asleep and unaware of the
outcome of nature. Until one fine day
when he felt warm inside his den and also very hungry, that made him wake up.
He was so hungry that he came out of his den in search of food. But he could
not find any food nearby that would suit his appetite. So he decided to go by
the riverside to catch few fishes to eat and he can also quench his thirst with
the river water. He went to the bank of the river far in that forest.
When the bear reached by the river,
he could find fishes bouncing near the river shores and his heartfelt with joy and satisfaction. He stood
by the side of the riverbank and gazed into the water for a moment. Very soon a
fish jumped near to him and he pounced at the fish and caught it immediately.
In the meantime, the bear saw another fish jumping up and down in the water. He
thought for a while and could conclude that the fish which he had in his hand
was smaller than the one in the river, so he decided to leave the smaller fish
and catch the bigger one.
No sooner than he left the smaller fish back into the
water, another fish bounced near him and he caught it easily at the very
instance. While he was about to eat the fish, then again, the bear thought,
"Even this fish looks too small and it can't fill my stomach." So he
waited for some time and said, "I
must catch a bigger fish now". The bear let off the second fish that he
had caught and waited until he caught another fish. Again he caught one more
fish, but even this time it seemed too small for the big bear.
Thinking that these fishes cannot
fill his belly he kept letting off the
fishes again and again back into the river which he had caught. He continually
kept targeting a bigger fish than the one he had caught in his hand. This way
from morning to evening he caught many such small fishes, but he let them all
go off because of his foolishness. The big bear left all the fishes those were sufficient enough to fill his stomach for the
entire day. By the sunset, the bear had not caught any big fish or the biggest
fish according to him and he felt very very hungry and at the same time tired
too. In the end, the bear remained empty stomach throughout the day and he
slowly began to understand and blame himself for his foolishness. He could realise his mistake and began to feel sorry for
letting off so many small fishes. He thought that all those small fishes
together would have been enough to fill his belly, and he said to himself,
"But now it is too late and this would be my only punishment to remain
hungry for tonight."
The big bear was hungry, but he had
no other choice for that day. What was even worse that he had been standing all
day long and kept catching those fishes, only to let them go off back into the
river water. The bear wasn't greedy for the fishes, but he was foolish to have
not understood the worth of the numerable
smaller fishes those were more than enough for his mighty belly. He was sad,
feeling guilty for himself. He walked empty-handed
by late in the evening staring for the last time at the silent river where no
longer the fishes were bouncing up on the river bed and with his starving stomach, he felt unaccomplished. But the big
bear carried a lesson for himself for the next day and for the rest of his
life, that no matter what, we should always value the things that God gives us whether
they are small or big. One small fish that the bear got first in his hand was
worth a big fish in the water to fill his starving stomach for that very moment
at the first instance.
Moral: Value things that you get in Life
and do not lose them because of
foolishness.
Reference: Various.
Find more Short Stories-
The Peacock and the Crane
Honesty is the best Policy
The Ant and the Dove
The Fox and the Grapes
The Magic of Patience
The Ant and the Grasshopper
Paromita Pramanick ©2018. All Rights Reserved.
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