A Day in the Life

A Day in the Life
These are a collection of entertaining stories involving people in my life (including myself).
Part one
I jumped
(As told to me by my sister, Donna)
The two best ways to describe my brother, Eric, when he was 10 are adventurous to the point of recklessness, and thin to the point of being bony. Those characteristics are important in this story so keep them in mind.
One of Eric’s favorite things to do as a child was to climb trees to see how high up he could get, or jump off of a tree at a certain height onto the 14ft trampoline in our backyard. On one particular occasion he made it to about 20ft up, lost his footing, and fell. That little adventure cost him six weeks with his arm in a cast. How he only broke one arm and no other bones is either a mystery or miracle, take your pick. My personal theory is that he was so skinny his sweater caught in the wind and he just sort of glided down. He probably would have been fine if he had known how to land.

Six weeks slowly passed as me and Donna unjustly got stuck with his chores. Hey, his arm was broke, not his legs, I have a right to complain.
One week after the cast came off, Donna and Eric were in the backyard and Eric was, once again, climbing trees. His tree of choice this time was a dogwood. Now, I don’t know if you know anything about Dogwood trees so here is a little educational fact. They aren’t big trees and have a lot of branches. Eric got pretty high up and started dangling from a branch about the size of his arm. Donna, being the caring sister she is, tried to warn him.
“You’re going to fall and break your arm again stupid.” I can almost hear her voice.
“No I’m not. Shut up!” Was his reply.

Donna shrugged and turned to walk into the house when she heard the dreaded but predictable, SNAP, WHOOSH, SNAP, CRASH, BOOM! She turned around as fast as she could, expecting to see my brother’s limp body lying beneath a pile of limbs. What she saw instead was Eric standing upright, legs stiff, arms stretched above his head with the broken branch still in his grip.
Eric looked at Donna and with as much pride as he could, said with a straight face. “I jumped!” It has been over 20 years and we still laugh about that.