Humor: Flying too close to my son

Flying too close to my son

This is one of the stories in my as yet unpublished book Jack and the Jellybean Stalk. Click the cover above to find out more

"Daddy, will you make me some wings?" my son Jack, 4, asked the other day.

"Wings!" I said. "What do you mean?"

"I want to be able to fly like Icarus," he replied.

Ah, yes, Icarus. Now I knew where he was coming from.
Lately a book on Greek mythology has become Jack's favourite bed-time reading matter.

When I was four, I was into stories like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Winnie the Pooh and Peter Pan.
But Jack often grabs the volume with an illustration on the front of a boy flying through the air with colourful wings, and says: "Can you read about Icarus to me?"

"Oh, no, not Icarus again," I cry. "There are lots of other stories in the book. Wouldn't you rather hear about Pandora's Box, Echo and Narcissus, Jason and the Golden Fleece or the Wooden Horse, Jack?"

"No I want you to read Icarus," he says. "That's a good one."

Sometimes I try to get out of it by saying I very much doubt that the story is based on real facts. His response is to glare back at me like I am stupid and believe that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Winnie the Pooh and Peter Pan are more believable.

Technically speaking, the book does not even belong to Jack.

I bought it for my wife Katherine late in her pregnancy after she despaired that her memory was deserting her, and she feared that she would not make a good mother because she could not remember key planks of the Greek mythology she had been taught by her parents.
Never question the logic of a hormonally-imbalanced woman.
I merely went out and bought the book as a gift, and told her not to worry.

I guess some people might find that touching.

Don't be.

My real intention was for Katherine to swot up during her long and painful labour.

After Jack's birth, Katherine lost all inclination to study up on Greek mythology, and the book has ended up on his bookshelf.

You probably know the story of Icacus, though not as well as I do now.

Icarus was the son of a famous inventor named Daedalus who was hired by the nasty king of the island of Crete, King Minos, to build him a palace which had as its basement a maze of many corridors.
At first, Daedalus did not know what the maze was for.
Then he discovered that King Minos had put a horrible beast - a Minotaur - at the heart of the maze and fed it on men and women.
He was horrified and wanted to leave Crete.
But King Minos had other ideas. Daedalus was the only person who knew the secret of the maze and how to escape from it.

"The secret must never leave this island," King Minos said. "So I am afraid I must keep you and Icarus here a while longer."

"How much longer?" gasped Daedalus.

"Oh - just until you die," replied Minos cheerfully.

Daedalus and Icarus were still kept in the lap of luxury, but they were forbidden to leave the palace.
Their rooms were in the tallest palace tower.
Daedalus, over a long period of time, collected feathers from birds who came to the tower and secretly made two sets of wings.
One morning, he woke Icarus and told him the two of them were going to jump out the window and fly to freedom.

He attached the wings to Icarus using candle wax and got Icarus to do likewise to him.

"I'm scared!" whispered Icarus as he stood on the narrow window ledge, his knees knocking and his hugh wings drooping down behind. The lawns and courtyards of the palace lay far below. The royal guards looked as small as ants. "This won't work."

"Courage, son!" said Daedalus. "Keep your arms out wide and fly close to me. Above all - are you listening, Icarus?"

"Y-y-yes, father."

"Above all, don't fly too close to the sun."

I guess you know what happened next. Icarus jumped and flew, Daedalus jumped and flew.

All was going splendidly, as the guards ran around like ants from a disturbed nest, and the two escapees flew lie birds over the sea.

But Icacus got a bit carried away.

He flew up, and up and up ... until he was too close to the sun.

His candle wax melted, his winds disintegrated and he plunged into the sea where he definitely did not live happily ever after.

I cannot think why Jack is so taken with this story.

It is quite obvious to me that he has not inherited my fear of flying at all.

Late last year, Jack and I flew from Canberra to Tasmania and back which is an experience I will not forget in a hurry.
I still wake up, in cold sweats in the middle of the night, with flashbacks. The plane hits serious turbulence and starts bouncing around, dropping suddenly.
I sit there, white as a ghost, knuckles clenched tightly, trying to remember the second line of Hail Mary.
Jack is sitting beside me, beaming, and shouting w-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e like a bare-back rodeo rider.
When the plane settles down again, he turns to me and says: "That was fun! Did you like that, daddy?"

"NO, I DID NOT," I say.

He takes my hand and tries to comfort me.

"It's all right, daddy. I'll look after you."

And now he wants me to make him some wings, so he can fly like Icarus!

He must be kidding.

Does he want me to make some wings for myself, too, like Daedalus, and fly close to him?

"It's okay, daddy," he consoles me again, picking up on my anxiety. "I'll look after you. Just don't fly too close to the sun. Are you listening?"

NB: I called this site Dunno because I kept drawing a blank when I had to put a name to it