Small difference

A small boy lived by the ocean. He loved all the creatures of the sea, especially the starfish, and spent much of his time exploring the seashores.

One day he learned that there would be a minus tide that would leave the starfish stranded on the sand. The day of the tide he went down to the beach and began picking up the stranded starfish and started tossing them back in the sea.

An elderly man who lived next door came to down to the beach to see what he was doing. “I’m saving the starfish.” The boy proudly declared.

When the neighbour saw all of the stranded starfish he shook his head and said, “I’m sorry to disappoint you young man, but if the look down the beach one way, there are stranded starfish as far as the eye can see. And if you look the other way, it’s the same. One boy like you isn’t going to make much of a difference.”

The boy thought about this for a moment. Then he reached his small hand down to the sand, picked up a starfish, tossed it back into the ocean and said, “I sure made a difference for that one”.