Small Stories #42

WHAT TASTE DO YOU LEAVE IN OTHERS’ MOUTHS?

There was an old man who was admitted in a hospital.

A young man visited him every day, and sat with him for more than one hour. He helped him eat his food, and to take his shower. Then he took him walking in the garden of the hospital. After that he brought him back to his room and helped him lie down.

He used to go away after reassuring himself that the old man is doing well.

One day the nurse entered the old man’s room, to give him medicine and inspect his condition, and she said to him:
“May the Lord be always gracious to your kind and caring son. Every day he visits you and shows great care.”

The old man looked at her and closed his eyes and said to her:
“I wish it was one of my children. This is an orphan from the neighborhood where we live. I met him one day in the past, crying at the door of a Church, after his father died. I comforted him and bought for him some candy. I neither saw him nor talked to him for a very long time by.

When he grew up and came to discover where my wife and I were living. He visited us every day to inspect our conditions. When I later fell sick, he took my old wife to his home. He then started coming to the hospital to see my treatment everyday. One day I asked him: “My son why do you have to deal with us and care about us?”

He simply smiled and said:
“The taste of the candy is still in my mouth “