I could hear the conversation over the grinding and crunching sounds of my poor printer. It had bitten off more than it could chew, and apparently so had my four-year-old son. He came in to ask me for dessert, and as I gritted my teeth and wrestled a piece of paper from the maws of ink destruction, I growled at him to go away.
His shoulders slumped as he shuffled off, and a stream of muttering hung in the air. The printer sympathized with its own whining and groaning, and I glared at them both for being difficult. As he rounded the corner into the family room, the muttering turned to whining, which turned into fitful tears.
Another country heard from: "What are you cryin' about?"
"Daaaaaddddeeeee, I huuunnngrrrrryy!"
I could hear the irritation building over the racket of the machine. "Then why don't you eat more of your dinner?"
"Noooo, I hungry for rock caaaannnddyy!" And the little man emphasized his point to the big man with a stamp on the floor for good measure.
"Then you're not hungry. You just want the candy. Hungry is different. Hungry is when you have a hole you need to fill..." and with that the printer gave up the fight and loosed the paper I had been sawing back and forth on as I listened. With a sigh of relief and a malevolent glare at the beast, I reset my document's printer settings and settled in to listen more to the philosophical discussion around the corner, but it was done. The gentlemen had moved on to more interesting pursuits, wrangling bathtime.
So that was it. "Hungry is when you have a hole you need to fill." How many times do we realize that we want something, but not enough to fight for it? We're just not hungry for it. On the other hand, how many people do we know, maybe even ourselves, who feel a hunger gnawing away a hole that we just can't fill? When does hunger fuel our work, and when does it burn away our hope?
Yes, there is a difference between want and hunger. What are you hungry for?
4 comments:
Oh wow, great question Rebecca.
I think the Gypsy in my blood makes me restless and gives me a hunger for going places.
You know, I kids have it right. When the ask for something, they ask for something specific. They don't beat about the bush. But they are learning that in life, it's the decision of others that affect your outcome.
I think we all face the thing where we metaphorically eat what others expect us to eat, to satisfy hunger. But ignoring the wants in life that will give us true satisfaction, even if its not necessarily the best choice you can make according to some arbitrary rule, is a failure of life.
Sometimes, the hungers that are too big for the hole that everyone can see is not what we are seeking to fill. It's the invisible hole that no one can see that we want to satisfy.
My stomach might be full, but for too long, the invisible stomach has been empty. Since you know what I am going through, you can fully understand why it is critical for me that i get that rock candy.
Well, now I'm hungry for rock candy. Okay, not really. That's more of a chocolate chip cookie sized hole.
Annie, sounds like that's a good thing in your life...you've certainly traveled! :)
Dani, I hope you get the rock candy you've been starving for. *hugs*
LOL, Wendy! Now I have a chocolate chip sized hole! Or maybe it's a rocky road ice cream hole...nah, I think it's a mocha brownie hole. Woman, you ruined my "eat right" resolution for the day! ;)
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