I knew what it meant to be a real father.

Yesterday at lunch my ten-year-old son called me and in a tragic voice said to me:

- Dad. You know? Me and the cat broke your lens. It was a complete accident, I swear to you.

Of course, I was upset, the lens was worth four months' salary. Sitting until the end of the day and twisting myself, they say, I will come home - I will tear off the ears of both juvenile hooligans, and I will unscrew the cat! They played out in my absence! I thought for a long time what to say to my son, so that he understood the value of things, finally came up with it.

My son came home from my doorstep.

- Dad, there's only fragments left... The badger jumped onto the windowsill where the lens was standing. I climbed up with him, and the cat... – crying, the son said with a trembling voice, – And the Barsik began to fall, I wanted to help him, but we all crashed right on the floor together with the lens. Daddy, it really, really happened by accident.

- Well, son," I began in a formidable voice, "Now you're going to have to sell your tablet, toys, computer and speakers to buy me a new lens.

The son nodded and, having lowered his head, rushed to his room. Badger after him. In five minutes, I look at you, beautiful. The boy dragged his tablet, and the cat - his favorite toy mouse!

- Son, what is this?

- Well, Dad, you said you had to find money for a new lens. So Barsik and I decided to start selling our stuff. Will you help me write the ads?

The little one stood crying. And then my heart got pinched. I think, "What am I doing?" My son has been sick for the second month, sitting at home alone with a cat, me and my wife at work. Of course, the teachers come to him, the lessons are checked. But he probably wants to go outside to run with friends, play. And he, the poor man, sits within four walls. Get rid of that lens! It's not worth it to make my son upset! No, of course, I will have to scold him more than once in my life for some lie or a non-male act, or a deuce... But for some broken or broken thing - never!

I hugged my son tightly and told him that I had forgiven him, that he should not sell his things. I also added that for the price of the lens, we could lay out all the walls of his room with a Lego designer. The son was discouraged by this statement, then smiled and said that he would never, ever break anything again.

But I said those words to my son for a reason. That day, I remembered a story from my childhood, when I took my father's car to drive around the village, and drove out on the track. Of course, at fifteen I had no rights or experience, so I flew safely into the ditch. The car was very subdued, and on me — amazing! — there was not a scratch. I went to our house and repented to my father. He silently gathered and went to the car lying in the ditch. And I stayed at home, waiting for justice and a belt. When the DPS-nickels arrived, their father told them that he was driving himself. He did not give me a single reproach. He just said, "Alive"? All right!

For years I had forgotten this story, but when my son first broke something, it immediately resurfaced in my memory. I realized that no broken object in the whole world is worth quarreling between loved ones and lovers.

The site is now in Classmates! Press:

via factroom.ru