Hsu Yun Chan Yuen
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The Box

by Shihan Fa Jue

Father opens the front door and walks into the entrybox. As he steps inside, he trips over daughter’s doll. "I thought I told her to pick up her toys," he mutters to himself.

Walking into the livingbox he notices son sitting on the floor watching TV. All around are toys and clothes scattered here and there. "Time to clean up this mess, son, before it’s time to leave." "Ok. Ok," comes the disgruntled reply. Son then picks up what belongs to him and takes it into his bedbox.

Entering the diningbox, father sees the morning’s dishes still on the table. "Guess I’ll have to clean this up, myself.," he says. He loads the dirty dishes into the dishbox and puts the cereal box into the cupbox. He gets the dishcloth and wipes off the microbox, cookingbox, and finishes with the coldbox. He then decides to check on daughter and son to make sure they are cleaning up their respective boxes properly.

Upon entering daughter’s bedbox, he picks up her clean clothes folded nicely on her bed and puts them into one of the sliding smallboxes located in the larger chest of boxes.

He then goes into son’s bedbox and picks up his jacket from the floor and hangs it on a hanger in the large clothesbox with sliding doors.

Mother calls to him from the bathbox were she is putting on her make up. "I’m almost read to go, father," she says. "This headache is slowing me down. Would you please get me some aspirin out of the medicine box."

Father complies and notices that the trash box in the bathbox is full; and he takes it out and empties it into the larger one located in the carbox.

The family, now ready to go, gets into the car and pulls out of the driveway.

"Father, look!" exclaims daughter. "Our house looks like a box. Why are you always telling us to put our stuff away in boxes? It’s already in a box. ONE BIG BOX."

Father stops and stares in amazement.  "So it is, daughter . . . so it is." 

 

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Last modified: July 11, 2004
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