‘Appreciation? What’s that?’

This one is something I read sometime back and it actually has quite a profound meaning. So here goes.

Jack happened to visit his neighbor Jim that morning. Jim has a dog called Max. Max is a wonderful dog. That day Jack was up early and happened to stroll past Jim’s courtyard. He noticed that in the morning Max had woken up before his master. He would climb on his two feet and unlock the door. He would then pick up the bottle of milk, go to the kitchen, leave the bottle of milk on the table, go out the door again to pick up the newspaper and keep it near his master’s favourite reclining chair. He would again head back outdoors to perform his routine actions. He also noticed that Max would come back home but not before wiping his feet on the doormat so that the house wouldn’t get dirty with his pug-marks.

‘Wow, what a smart dog’ Jack thought to himself. ‘I must compliment Jim for having such a fantastic dog, he is indeed lucky’. Saying this he strolled into Jim’s house (which was open) only to find to his shock and horror that Jim was beating up Max with his leash calling him ‘a stupid son of a bitch’. Jack hurriedly rushed to stop Jim ‘HEY JIM, STOP IT, WHAT ARE YOU DOING??? WHY ARE YOU BEATING HIM?’. What Jim said shocked the daylights out of Jack. Jim was beating Max because ‘the stupid son of a bitch didn’t close the door on his way back in’. Jack looked at Jim with deep sense of disgust and said ‘You are outta your mind, he’s done much more than any other dog that I have ever seen, can’t you see that leave alone appreciate it?’. Jim got even more angry ‘APPRECIATION? NO WAY, WHY DIDN’T HE CLOSE THE FUCKING DOOR, HE DESERVES TO BE BEATEN UP’.

Jack's heart sunk for the poor dog that was cowering under the table trying desperately to avoid the next lash of his master’s leash. What happened next was that Jack called the local Animal Welfare organization and rescued the poor dog which had one eye bleeding. A case was filed against Jim for Animal abuse. Jack decided to adopt Max. and thus began a lifelong relationship of trust, love, appreciation and giving :)

What’s the message behind this story? That no matter how hard you try to please someone, if they only want to look at the things you did not do, then they will punish you; instead of rewarding you with the most basic thing that we call appreciation. And that is very uncool. You may or may not appreciate good behavior but punishing severely will only result in that person or thing moving away from you. And its more likely that they will leave permanently. So if you have a Max-like person in your life remember to show your appreciation and  never let that person go. But, if there is a Jim in you life, never try to change him or her because he or she dosent want to change. And if he or she cannot appreciate what you bring to the table, then let them eat alone J J they simply don’t deserve your company.