F.T.F.

I thought I’d hid that cape. We didn’t need another episode. But Leo appeared out of nowhere last night with headlamp, suspenders and a gold cape ready to zoom through the night in a rush of spring fever.
Just a few days earlier, his pal, cape securely fastened, made a leap from the top bunk with visions of soaring. He had been coaxed into doing it, the story goes. They’d spread a few comforters on the floor, just in case. And then he belly flopped and wound up with a nose bleed and two black eyes.

Failure to fly.

Thus began the safety talks, the difference between make believe and reality and how bones are both bendy and breakable. And really, it’s a knight’s cape…with a fleur de lis stitched on the back. Knights rode horses, fought battles and protected people from bandits. They definitely didn’t fly.

So when I saw the cape rush past me and out the back door last night, I wasn’t sure what to do. I didn’t want to squash the energy and the imaginative play, but I didn’t need a repeat of the failed launch. I sat back and quietly watched while he ran as fast as he could trying to get the cape to flap in the wind. And he did get it to flap a little, but he never quite got off the ground.

all images © Tim LaBarge 2010