Toys

Today was Sunday. Shivani got up from bed, it was 7 a.m. Today she got up late as she and her husband had a holiday at office. Even her 4 year son had a holiday at his play school.They both were still sleeping. She got up, had her bath and made some coffee and toast for her. She was going to the dinning area to have her breakfast, but suddenly one of the small toy of her son lying on the floor unnoticeably hurt her foot badly and the whole breakfast fell down.

She got very angry first but she cleaned the mess and again went to make breakfast. While having her breakfast she was just looking around. She saw there were so many toys, some were new, some were old and some had even broken.

She and her husband were working for a multinational company. With their busy schedule, they were not able to spend much time with their son, so they use to bring toys every now and then to make him happy. They always thought that these materialistic things can make their child happy as well as occupied.

In the mean while, the door bell rang. It was her maid. Today she had brought her 2 year old daughter along with her. As soon as she entered, she said madam today my daughter is not feeling well, she was crying a lot so I brought her with me. She will not disturb you. She will sit in one corner and play, by that time I will complete my work fast.

Shivani was good at heart. She agreed. The maid started with her work and the child sat in one corner of the room. There was a basket of broken toys nearby. The child started playing with them. Shivani was very happy to see the child playing even with the broken toys and still so happy and content. The child enjoyed the toys thoroughly.

One hour passed but the child was still sitting on the same place and was playing with the toys. Shivani told her maid to feed the child with some milk and biscuits as the child was playing for quite long time. The child ate heartily and soon felt asleep. The maid went to complete her remaining work.

Shivani was sitting on the nearby couch and was looking at the child. She started thinking her maid was working at 5 houses in the same society, but then to she cared for her daughter so much.

Daily I am out for work atleast for 9 to 10 hours every day. My son is in the day care and I am not able to spend much time with him. This doesn't mean that she didn't loved her child or cared for him. She always felt that she was not able to manage with her busy schedule. Even though she wanted to spend quality time with him, but situations would arise such that by the end of the day she was always exhausted. She thought she would compensate this by purchasing expensive toys for her son, but her son never enjoyed with those toys.

She said in her mind, my son had started becoming cranky and always keeps on complaining for some or the other things. She had never seen satisfaction on his face as she was looking now on the baby's face.

She got up from her place and started collecting some of the old toys in the carry bag. To her surprise she collected two big bags of old toys. 

After sometime time her maid completed her work and was about to leave. Shivani stopped her and handed her both the bags of toys. Along with the toys she gave one more bag of old clothes of her son, which were new enough. The maid was very happy on receiving so many things. Shivani told her not to come for the household work for the next three days . Come to work on the fourth day.

Shivani was happy as she was able to help someone in need and felt very good from within. She called her boss and asked for three days leave. Surprisingly the boss agreed. She made a plan to go to the nearby hillstation and spend some quality time with her family. She happily went to wake up both father and son.

We people always pile up many unwanted things in our house. Unknownly we purchase so many things and hardly use it. It's same with our children toys. Nowadays people buy unwanted toys and gifts to their kids and they think they are buying happiness. Each and every child of this generation is familiar with mobile phones, video games, tabs, laptops and computers. We as a parent are the one who introduce these things to our children. But every child whether he is from the poor background or rich, they don't require these material things. They require your valuable time. Rather than expensive gifts and toys they require your presence.

Now a days not only working parents but parents who stay at home have issues with spending quality time with their kids. People are busy with their TV and phones and children are neglected and stuffed with packaged food than home cooked healthy food.

Your presence can bring priceless satisfaction and happiness on your kids face, which cannot be purchased with materialist things.

Children are very innocent. They don't understand the dirty money game. We have to be natural with them. We should be able to manage with our busy schedules and spend quality time with kids.

Children are not toys, stop playing with their feelings.

Teach them to share and love.