Clouds

Clouds

A white Owl was sitting on a branch looking up. He’d looked at the sky many times but never really thought about it before. He knew he could fly through the sky, so the sky was clear. He also knew sometimes it had big winds that hurled around papers or branches. And of course, there was rain and snow which fell down from up there somewhere.

Today he was looking at clouds. There were clouds most days and Owl started to wonder why he’d never landed on them. They certainly looked as solid as trees. He loved that they were the same color as he was, and they looked soft. Owl liked soft. He started wondering if he flew up far enough, could he land on a cloud? He decided to try.

He took off, and he aimed up. Pretty soon he was higher than he had ever been before. He could see over all the trees to a big hill and more beyond that. He could see houses and buildings and streets he never knew were there. Still he flew higher.

After a while, he got really tired. This was the furthest he’d flown in his whole life. And worse, not even one cloud seemed any nearer. Finally, he decided he had to give up, at least for today. Gently he let himself fall back, just to give his wings a rest, then, getting close to the treetops, he flapped back to his tree for a much needed nap.

Joe and Frankie were laying on their backs in the schoolyard.

“Did you see that? A cloud just fell out of the sky!”

“Right… you know, apparently too much sugar can rot your brain…”

“Humm, I guess we should have dropped Mom’s cookies off at the bake sale after all.”