Hug a Friend and patch some holes

It's National Friendship week - so my email inbox tells me. Got this - thought it was a unique enough message to post here. Gave me pause for thought. I used to have a real temper, when I first moved out from the 'Beer house'.

It also made me reflect on an incident that just happened in my life. My work responsibilities collided head on with my personal life. It's hard to be someone's boss and their friend. Well, not hard when things are good, but hard when they go south and get messy. I wondered if we would get past it...but as the story goes - scars last forever.


NAIL IN THE FENCE
Make sure you read all the way down to the last sentence. (Most importantly the last sentence) There once was a little boy who had a bad temper. His Father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, he must hammer a nail into the back of the fence. The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence. Over the next few weeks, as he learned to control his anger, the number of nails hammered daily gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence. Finally the day came when the boy didn't lose his temper at all. He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper. The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. He said, "You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out. It won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry, the wound is still there. " A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one. Friends are very rare jewels, indeed. They make you smile and encourage you to succeed. They lend an ear, they share words of praise and they always want to open their hearts to us."


Sorry, too lazy to reformat it. Good message though.


>^..^<