The Fool & His Wife

Ken Chandler
Copyright © 2009

The Fool & His Wife

A foolish man married a lazy woman and they lived in a drafty shack near a deep woods. Driven from their home by robbers they took to the road with only the shirts on their backs as the only protection from the growing cold. They had become accustomed to hunger, but soon their hunger became extreme and they mustered the strength to go in search of something to fill their empty and aching stomaches. Not accustomed to exercise the woman sat down below a tree to rest and get shelter from the cold. She noticed a rotting apple on the ground beside her, and being too lazy to check herself, asked her husband if there was more fruit borne on the tree. He stared at the trunk of the tree with intensity for some time and after a time, returned that there was none to be seen on the tree.
“Husband, you fool. Look into the branches, you’ll find the fruit in the tops of the trees.”

Looking into the branches of the tree a wondrous smile crossed his face and he reported that there was an abundance of food, enough for them both. When he made no move to gather the fruit his wife demanded that he get the fruit so she could eat. By and by the man climbed into the tree and plucked every last apple and brought them down to her. When he tried to take one to eat, the lazy woman declared that the food was hers and hers alone, and that he should get food for himself elsewhere.

For a few moments he longingly watched his wife eat the succulent apples before turning into the growing darkness in search of food for himself. The lazy woman polished off the apples and quickly fell into a deep slumber. The next morning the woman waited and waited for her husbands return, and she waited and waited. She occasionally mustered up the strength to yell his name and demand that he come to her at once, but he never came back. Before long, her hunger overcame her, and she rose shakily to her feet. She traveled about 200 yards before her legs ached and she found another tree under which to rest her weary feet. A day and a night passed, and still, her husband eluded her. Her cries of fiery indignation carried through the woods, then desperate for her husbands return, then faint with hunger her cries died out all together. A hunter found her dead, and she was properly buried without ceremony. She and her husband were not missed, nor mourned.