Adrenaline Junkie

This is apparently where my older child is happiest - in midair. He has no fear, except of being left alone to fall asleep in his big boy bed, but that's another post entirely. Reeves discovered he was able to "jump" off of things sometime last winter. He enjoyed it and would often decend from such heights as 6 inches. Of course, this was really more pseudo graceful falling rather than actual jumping. Then, just before he turned two, he masterd the act of jumping with two feet off the ground. (That's with both feet, Gams, not two vertical feet!) Oh the joy hopping around brought him. He was so proud of himself, and so were we. But now, now we have entered into a whole new realm, the world of really jumping OFF of things.
It began innocently enough when Jodie put this slide next to the pool for the children to slide in. True, it's not a huge slide, but the children, mostly 3, 4, and 5 year olds were perfectly content to climb the two steps up the back and slide down, on their bottoms, into the pool. Enter Reeves. First, he slides down it on his back, headfirst, into the pool. But that's not dangerous enough for him. He spent the rest of his time on the slide jumping from the top into the pool. And that's the only way he would do it. And he loved it. Did you know swimmies sometimes come off when a child launches himself into a pool? Well, they do. Not that Reeves cared. Thank heavens for Jodie and others to whom Reeves now owes his life. Turns out you don't just swim in a circle with only one swimmie; you actually start to sink.
Van told Bryant that he saw lots of stitches and broken bones in our future. There was nothing Bryant could but nod and agree because that statement is so true. Of course, I figured it would be a few years away. Reeves has other plans.
Tuesday at playgroup, I thought we were going to have to leave and go to the hospital. None of us saw how it started. We picked it up after he was already midair. Reeves jumped from the top of DuBose's slide. Just so you know, I'm 5'7". The top of the slide is at my eye level. Nancy saw him in the air twice. I only saw him just before he hit the ground, after he had bounced halfway down. He landed and started crying and holding his left arm. We all just knew he had broken it. How could he have not? He landed with his arm under him, but on top of a toy rake. He must have a pretty good guardian angel. I picked him up, hugged him, and tried to feel his arm for the break. Nothing, but even more telling was the fact that his cry didn't intensify while I was doing that. I am still in shock. He has a couple of pretty good bruises, but no broken bones. Thank heavens!
Maybe this has taught him. He hasn't tried it since then, but I know it's only a matter of time before the lure of a good freefall becomes too much for him, and he goes at it again. Danger Bair, that's our son!