Kaew didn’t like bedtime.
She wanted to keep playing, keep watching cartoons, keep sitting and talking with her mother. Every single night, the words “I’m not sleepy yet” would ring out from her room.
That is, until Grandfather came to visit last winter.
Grandfather was a quiet old man with a full head of white hair, hands rough but gentle to the touch. He brought with him an old golden clock.
“I’ve had this clock since I was your age,” Grandfather said, sitting at the edge of Kaew’s bed. “It’s old, but it still keeps good time.”
Kaew looked at the clock. It had three hands — a short one, a long one, and a tiny one that moved very fast.
“Can you count the clock’s hands?” Grandfather asked.
“Yes! Three of them.”
“Then try counting slowly. One… take a deep breath in. Two… let it out slowly. Three… then close your eyes.”
Kaew followed along. One, breathe in. Two, breathe out. Three, close your eyes.
“Now think of the place you’d most like to be,” Grandfather said, his voice growing softer. “Somewhere that feels warm and safe.”
Kaew thought of her grandmother’s house in the countryside — the backyard garden with the big mango tree, the smell of jasmine flowers, the sound of crickets in the evening.
“Once you’re there, count again,” Grandfather kept saying. “One, breathe in. Two, breathe out. Three…”
Kaew didn’t hear the rest, because she had already fallen asleep.
From that night on, every time she couldn’t sleep, Kaew would pick up Grandfather’s clock, kept on her headboard, and count the hands one by one, breathing along, thinking of Grandmother’s backyard garden.
She never took more than ten minutes to fall asleep.
Grandfather went home after staying with them for two weeks, but he left the old clock behind for her.
“Keep it,” Grandfather told her. “Whenever it’s bedtime, think of me too, and I’ll be with you every night.”
Kaew hugged the clock tightly.
Tonight, like every night, Kaew lay down, picked up the clock, counted its three hands, breathed along with the rhythm, thought of the mango tree garden, thought of Grandfather.
And then she fell asleep.
In her dream, she sat beneath the mango tree with Grandfather, just like before. Neither of them said a word — they simply sat together, listening to the crickets, feeling that everything was exactly as it should be.
Sweet dreams, Kaew.
Moral: Rest is just as important as playing or studying. Our body and mind need quiet stillness to grow. Try breathing slowly, thinking of someone you love, and let yourself rest for a while.
