Theme: Simplicity and humility

The valuable key

The boy, agitated, came and went through the house. He was looking for something very important to him.

His mother, sensing his distress, went to help him and asked, interested:

- Darling, are you sure it isn’t in the key box?

- I am, mother, it should be there, it was the first place I looked, but I have not found it - he replied.

-But it does not hurt to look there again.

The boy then opened the box where the family keys have been kept. He looked at them all carefully and exclaimed sadly:

- No, the most important key is not here!

He closed the box and put it back in place.

Inside, the keys could hear the boy's agitation and accompany his dialogue with his mother. Realizing that the subject was about one of them, that it has disappeared, they began to talk.

The iron key, which locked the front door of the house and was the largest of them all, said:

- How could this boy not have seen me here? He must have vision problems. He said he was looking for the most important key. It's certainly me!

- Oh, do not be silly - said the garage key. - You're not the most important key, it's me! I keep the driveway and the cars. Before they reach you, they have to pass me by.

- And? - Said a thick key, but small and very pretty. - I close the silver cutlery box. You can be changed at any time. However, I will stay here for many years. For the value of the objects I keep, let's speak the truth: who is the most important here?

- Ha ha ha! - Laughed ironically, the key of the safe. - What a pretense!

And it went on, turning to the cutlery key:

- Know that I keep the family jewels, the dollars left over from the trip they made and gold objects! - And, almost shouting, it concluded: - I am far more important than all of you together!

The cutlery’s key, which was humiliated by her colleague's comments, answered harshly:

- Yes, but there is a key more important than all of us here. Otherwise the boy would have found it.

The keys agreed, but they could not figure out which key was the most important. It was then that the key to the desk drawer reminded them:

- The only one of us which is not here is that little thin one. Is it? - It said sheepishly.

- Which one? - Asked the iron key. - I do not remember any keys like that here in our box.

- I think there is – the lock key said. - But of course, it cannot be it. It's tiny! Insignificant!

The keys still spoke when they heard the boy cries out happily:

- I found it! I found it, Mother! It has fallen on the rug, where I had seen my chest for the last.

The boy, very happy, opened a rustic wooden box. There he kept his favorite objects: the knife he had won from his uncle; his photo riding the horse from Grandma's site; a colored feather he had found on the walk in the woods with his father; the medal he won in the swimming competition. And other little things that were very important to him.

So that it would not be lost again, his mother tied the precious little key in a beautiful gold ribbon, and they hung it on a hook on the wall, where everybody could see.

From inside the box, the keys watched in silence. Pensive, now none of them wanted to say anything else.
 

Translation:
Larissa Martine - larissa_am@hotmail.com

marcelapradacontato@gmail.com