{"id":15402,"date":"2017-03-03T19:41:36","date_gmt":"2017-03-03T09:41:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=15402"},"modified":"2024-07-02T01:38:40","modified_gmt":"2024-07-01T15:38:40","slug":"the-value-of-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=15402","title":{"rendered":"The Value of &#8216;Time&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>*The Value of &#8216;Time&#8217; &#8211; Please take &#8216;Time&#8217; to read this before it is too late&#8230;&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>Sometimes little things means SO much to certain people!!*<\/p>\n<p>A young man learns what&#8217;s most important in life from the guy next door.<\/p>\n<p>Over the phone, his mother told him, \u201cMr. Belser died last night. The funeral is Wednesday.&#8221; Memories flashed through his mind like an old newsreel as he sat quietly remembering his childhood days.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Jack, did you hear me?&#8221; &#8220;Oh, sorry, Mom. Yes, I heard you. It&#8217;s been so long since I thought of him. I&#8217;m sorry, but I honestly thought he died years ago,&#8221; Jack said&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Well, he didn&#8217;t forget you. Every time I saw him he&#8217;d ask how you were doing. He&#8217;d reminisce about the many days you spent over &#8216;his side of the fence&#8217; as he put it,&#8221; Mom told him.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I loved that old house he lived in,&#8221; Jack said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You know, Jack, after your father died, Mr. Belser stepped in to make sure you had a man&#8217;s influence in your life,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s the one who taught me carpentry,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t be in this business if it weren&#8217;t for him. He spent a lot of time teaching me things he thought were<\/p>\n<p>important. Mom, I&#8217;ll be there for the funeral,&#8221; Jack said.<\/p>\n<p>As busy as he was, he kept his word. Jack caught the next flight to his hometown. Mr. Belser&#8217;s funeral was small and uneventful. He had no children of his own, and most of his relatives had passed away.<\/p>\n<p>The night before he had to return home, Jack and his Mom stopped by to see the old house next door one more time.<\/p>\n<p>Standing in the doorway, Jack paused for a moment. It was like crossing over into another dimension, a leap through space and time. The house was exactly as he remembered. Every step held memories- every picture, every piece of furniture. Jack stopped suddenly&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s wrong, Jack?&#8221; his Mom asked.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The box is gone,&#8221; he said<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What box?&#8221; Mom asked.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There was a small gold box that he kept locked on top of his desk. I must have asked him a thousand times what was inside. All he&#8217;d ever tell me was \u2019the thing I value most,'&#8221; Jack said.<\/p>\n<p>It was gone. Everything about the house was exactly how Jack remembered it, except for the box. He figured someone from the Belser family had taken it.<br \/>\n&#8220;Now I&#8217;ll never know what was so valuable to him,&#8221; Jack said. &#8220;I better get some sleep. I have an early flight home, Mom.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>It had been about two weeks since Mr. Belser died. Returning home from work one day Jack discovered a note in his mailbox. &#8220;Signature required on a package. No one at home. Please stop by the main post office within the next three days,&#8221; the note read.<\/p>\n<p>Early the next day Jack retrieved the package. The small box was old and looked like it had been mailed a hundred years ago. The handwriting was difficult to read, but the return address caught his attention. &#8220;Mr. Harold Belser&#8221; it read. Jack took the box out to his car and ripped open the package. There inside was the gold box and an envelope. Jack&#8217;s hands shook as he read the note inside.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Upon my death, please forward this box and its contents to Jack Bennett. It&#8217;s the thing I valued most in my life.&#8221; A small key was taped to the letter. His heart racing, as tears filled his eyes, Jack carefully unlocked the box. There inside he found a beautiful gold pocket watch.<\/p>\n<p>Running his fingers slowly over the finely etched casing, he unlatched the cover. Inside he found these words engraved:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Jack, Thanks for your time! -Harold Belser.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The thing he valued most was&#8230; My time&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Jack held the watch for a few minutes, then called his office and cleared his appointments for the next two days. &#8220;Why?&#8221; Janet, his assistant asked.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I need some time to spend with my son,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Oh, by the way, Janet, thanks for your time!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Think about this. You may not realize it, but it&#8217;s 100% true.<\/p>\n<p>1. At least 15 people in this world love you in some way..<br \/>\n2 A smile from you can bring happiness to anyone, even if they don&#8217;t like you.<br \/>\n3 Every night, SOMEONE thinks about you before they go to sleep.<br \/>\n4. You mean the world to someone.<br \/>\n5. If not for you, someone may not be living.<br \/>\n6. You are special and unique.<br \/>\n7. When you think you have no chance of getting what you want, you probably won&#8217;t get it, but if you trust d faith to do what&#8217;s best, and wait on ur time, sooner or later, you will get it or something better.<br \/>\n8. When you make the biggest mistake ever, something good can still come from it.<br \/>\n9. When you think the world has turned its back on you, take a look: you most likely turned your back on the world.<br \/>\n10. Someone that you don&#8217;t even know exists loves you.<br \/>\n11. Always remember the compliments you received. Forget about the rude remarks.<br \/>\n12. Always tell someone how you feel about them; you will feel much better when they know and you&#8217;ll both be happy.<br \/>\n13. If you have a great friend, take the time to let them know that they are great.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Thanks for your thoughts and your precious time.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>*The Value of &#8216;Time&#8217; &#8211; Please take &#8216;Time&#8217; to read this before it is too late&#8230;&#8230;. Sometimes little things means SO much to certain people!!* A young man learns what&#8217;s most important in life from the guy next door. Over the phone, his mother told him, \u201cMr. Belser died last night. The funeral is Wednesday.&#8221; &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=15402\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;The Value of &#8216;Time&#8217;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-interest","category-inspiration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15402"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52407,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15402\/revisions\/52407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}