Week 3 Storytelling- Golden Deer, Golden Purse

They were madly in love, and crazy poor. Everyone told them they were crazy for getting married so young. Both were working late nights to put themselves through school. They were exhausted and in an unfamiliar place, but they couldn’t be any happier. Max wanted to give Charlotte everything though. He knew she had given up a lot of amazing things to be with him. She came from a very wealthy family and was used to the finer things in life. Charlotte didn’t care about those things anymore, but she couldn’t help but stop and peak in the window at a few of the boutiques she used to shop at. There was one purse in particular that caught her eyes, it shimmered all over with gold beading. She would quickly look away and wince after noticing the price tag. Max noticed the look in her eyes when she saw that purse. For some reason, he wanted nothing more than to get it for her.

Max started taking on even later shifts at his job to try to save money. He told himself, “If I could just get that purse for her, she would really know how much I appreciate her.”

Image: Pouch-iPurse -gold 4,

Author: Ipurse, Source: Wikimedia

Charlotte was confused as to why Max was gone so late all of the time. The couple started spending less and less time together. At first Charlotte didn’t say anything. She tried to be strong for them, and figured Max maybe just needed some space. Max kept taking up more shifts, and Charlotte kept missing him more and more. Finally, one day he had earned enough money to buy the purse. He couldn’t contain his excitement. He rushed home after his last late shift. He had been working so many hours, he started counting in his head the extra hours he’d put in that week. He was so exhausted. He kept thinking about how wonderful it would be to give Charlotte her present, and fall right asleep. Now that he was thinking about it, he hadn’t actually slept in a few days. His eyelids grew heavy. He knew he was almost home, he could make it. He kept thinking of Charlotte… dreaming of her.

He woke up in the hospital the next morning. Charlotte was draped over his chest weeping. She explained to him that he had fallen asleep at the wheel. Her tears of anxiety were beginning to turn into tears of joy and relief as Max came to.

Author’s Note

This story is based off of a portion of R.K. Narayan’s The Ramayana A Shortened Modern Prosed Version of the Indian Epic. In one story, Rama chases after the golden deer that Sita found and asked for. Rama wants to give Sita everything she asks for, since she has done so much for him- Sita chose to follow Rama out into the forest when he was wrongfully exiled. Unfortunately, the deer turned out to be a trap set up by Ravana. Once Rama was lured away by the deer, Ravana was able to kidnap Sita.

Max is like Rama, but instead of leading his wife out into the forest Max had led his wife to a poor life. I tried to think of ways that people today have pure motives for their actions, and want to please the one they love, but end up doing more harm than good. In this story, Max would never feel good enough for his wife until he could provide a worthy present for her. By the end of the story, however, you can imagine that Charlotte wished she had never even laid eyes on that purse. Both Max and Rama just wanted to make their wives happy, but in the end it wasn’t worth the price they ultimately paid.

Bibliography

Narayan, R. K. The Ramayana A Shortened Modern Prose Version of the Indian Epic. London: Penguin Classics, 2006. Print.