Fly kite, break arm

So there I was, in my hands the finest thing you ever did see. Wax crayon coloured brown paper cut into a neat diamond shape and carefully sellotaped  to the two narrow plant prop sticks that had previously been supporting my mothers precious cheese plant stems, but were now the back bone cross of my self made kite.

I took my master piece out into our relatively small back garden, which at the age of six, was mine and my older brother's  amazing play ground. "Look what I have made" I shouted at the top of my voice to him, "Its gunna fly like a bird". To my joy, Martin actually took an instant interest and helped me find a very long length of very narrow string (Which I later found out to be called 'gardeners twine' due to the fact that my father spent ages and ages looking for it but it never turned up).

Once the twine was tied tightly around the cross section of the two sticks, it was time for lift off. We went to the foot of our garden and after several attempts realized that there was something missing. "A tail", my brother exclaimed as he ran of into our house. Moments later he returned with a long length of my mothers quality dress making tape.

A few attempts later, and we decided that more wind was needed. This was the point where Martin explain to me how the wind works. The higher you are, the more wind there is, was the point that he was making. This was where the decision was made to use the added height of my fathers flat roofed garden shed. A brilliant idea that even Einstein would have been proud of.

So there I stood, kite in hand ready to launch from the roof of dads shed and my trusted brother by my side, except his by your side version this time included being about seven foot below me with his feet planted on solid ground.

My beautiful hand crafted kite was in its element, it seemed to not only find the wind it needed, but it actually felt like it was creating it with its desire to fly. I launched it, with the twine loosely gripped in my left hand, I released my bird of prey. It flew, I fed it more twine and it went higher. More twine, higher, more twine, higher. It was flying just as I had envisaged it. Perfect. It was going from side to side performing this amazing figure of eight manoeuvre and it looked wonderful.

Barely more than a few half minutes had gone by when "Its sinking, its sinking, what should I do?" I shouted to my dear brother, totally wrapped up in what I was doing and totally forgetting that I had climbed onto my fathers shed. "Quickly. Run backward, it needs more wind". was his reply. I later found out that he had also forgotten where I was.

Half way down from the roof of my fathers shed I heard the distinct sound of my mother screaming. She had peered out of the kitchen window just in time to see my back foot be placed down on to the nothingness which surrounded the said shed. Somehow, as I had fallen I had twisted, I was now coming down face first toward the exact spot where my father had vertically sunken some very large plastic pipes which formed perfect growing areas for fuchsias.

On the last part of this very quick journey there was a combination of sound and pain as my out stretched arms made contact. It was the worry that I was in trouble that first stopped me noticing, I put my hands behind me as I quickly got to my feet, but my mother was running toward me with her arms out stretched and tears on her cheeks. "She wants a cuddle" I thought, pleased that she was not shouting because of her broken flowers. I reached out to grab her, Oh boy, did I want a hug. Screeeccchhhh. she stopped. I followed her gaze, blood, oh, blood. Her final few steps were slow ones, but she sure did give me the most amazing loving hug that I could ever remember getting. As my arms wrapped around her neck and came back into my view I first noticed how grazed my palms were. As I turned my hands I noticed that my left one was not quite where it should be.

It was when I sat on the hospital bed that I remember hearing the doctor telling my mother how pleased he was with how he had managed to join everything back together and repair the torn skin where the bones had protruded.

I never did get in trouble for what happened that day, although I was told to stay off of the shed several times in the following years.

I have no idea who that doctor was but to this day, nearly 40 years later. I have had no problems what so ever and am eternally grateful for his efforts.