August 25, 2007

“Mom! Mom! Where are you?” Ziyan called as he ran down the stairs, taking two at a time.

“Oh! Ziyan! Don’t speak so loudly. Your father is entertaining some guests,” admonished his mother as she came out of the kitchen.

Ziyan apologised and then asked her, “Have you seen my brown watch? I can’t find it anywhere.”

“No! Did you check in the side table drawers?”

“I have checked everywhere. It’s not in my room. I think somebody stole it. Maybe that new girl whom you hired for cleaning did this,” he said in an angry tone.

“Ziyan! You shouldn’t blame anyone unless you are sure. It hurts people,” his mother said. “I’ll go and look for it in your room.”

She walked up the stairs and went inside his room. Ziyan followed her. She checked the drawers and among his books on the bookshelves but she couldn’t find it. After searching for half an hour she sat down on his bed.

“I told you, it’s not here. It has been stolen. I think you should fire the new servant,” he looked smugly at his mother.

“Well! I’ll ask her if she has seen it when she comes in the morning.” She started to get up from the bed. As she adjusted the pillow she saw something shiny under it. She picked up the pillow and there it was — the lost brown watch.

She picked it up and held it in front of Ziyan. “Isn’t this what you were looking for?” she asked angrily, “This is a real bad habit of yours. Every time you forget or misplace something you blame somebody else for it. Have you ever considered how YOU would feel if you were at the receiving end of such a blame?” She gave him the watch and then walked out of the room.

Ziyan was a friendly and well-behaved child but he had one bad habit — he always tended to blame others whenever something went wrong. Almost everyone around him, his friends, family and servants, had suffered at one time or the other because of this attitude of his. People tended to be wary of him and tried to be careful around him.

Of course! Nobody likes to be blamed for something they didn’t do. His family was very tired of his habit so they decided to do something about it.

Sure enough, in a matter of few days whenever things went wrong in the household, everybody in the family held one person responsible for it and that person was Ziyan.

One morning, his father scolded him for using up all the balance in his mobile when actually Ziyan had not done so. Then, he was scolded for spilling ink over his sister’s assignment. The very next day, his mother took him to task, blaming him for having broken two flowerpots in the garden.

In the subsequent days, the list kept growing. He was blamed for each and every mishap in the household and he became more and more miserable.

He finally broke down two weeks later when his father scolded him, for leaving the car doors unlocked while it was parked on the street.

Ziyan sat down on the sofa and looked up with a miserable face.

“Please don’t scold me. I didn’t leave it unlocked. Why is everybody blaming me for everything that goes wrong, even when they haven’t seen me doing it?” His father looked at him with a soft smile, “Isn’t that what YOU always do?”

Ziyan stared at him while realisation dawned on his face.

“Ziyan! We wanted you to realise that it hurts when people are blamed without reason and they prefer to stay away from such a person. We don’t want you to end up alone.”

“I am sorry, Father! Now I know how it feels,” replied Ziyan.

Afterwards he apologised to his family and promised them that he would never blame anyone again without being sure of it.