Parable of the Egg Delivery Guy

Once upon a time, there’s this guy named Rod. Rod was an average guy, getting average grades, has average friends. He lived a relatively average life with his parents and brothers.

One day when he was 11, he told his dad he wanted to start earning. He wanted to find some sort of extra income, and he was summer-bored anyway. His dad suggested that he delivered eggs to a local bakery. Rod considered it, and using his savings, he started his delivery service.

You’d think this was a big-time delivery service, but it’s not. Hello, he’s just 14. And his business didn’t consist of a poultry farm, even a small one, either. He bought eggs from the wet market and, using his bike, delivered it to the bakery. His savings were just enough to buy him two trays of eggs.

You’d also think that the bakery he delivered the eggs to be a newly opened, small-time bakery, but it’s not. It was a medium sized bakery, supplying baked goods to a several blocks of houses. They usually order baking ingredients like milk, flour and eggs in bulk. From this we can tell that the two trays of eggs that Rod delivers really isn’t very significant. The bakery could well work without them actually.

Rod’s father knows this too. That’s why from the start, he told Rod one thing: that the eggs he was delivering were very, very important, that the bakery cannot produce bread for the day if he did not deliver.

So off he went everyday. He would take his bike and go to the market, purchase two trays of eggs, then go back and deliver them to the bakery. The owner of the bakery didn’t seem to mind the idea that Rod was only wasting his time delivering eggs everyday; anyway he wanted someone to talk to. He appreciated his efforts and would even sometimes remind him to come and deliver to the bakery the next day. In other words, he was reinforced to do what he was doing.

Rod, little by little, saved enough to buy and deliver three trays, then four, then five. By the time he was around 17 or 18, he needed a tricycle, then a mini delivery van. He expanded his delivery services; he delivered to stores and bakeries in the neighboring blocks. Eventually the bakery became dependent on his egg deliveries. What his father said had come true: the eggs he was delivering were very, very important, that the bakery cannot produce bread for the day if he did not deliver.

Rod was an average kid, but he wasn’t stupid. Of course he knew how big the bakery was, and he sure got an idea that whatever he was doing was basically useless. Nonetheless, he had a positive mindset so strong that whatever useless things actually turned out useful. He was an average kid with an extraordinary mindset.

I don’t know where Rod is now. He was a friend of my dad anyway and I never met him. Oh, haven’t I mentioned this was a true story? It is.