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Do you remember when we would play parachutes? I believe that it started after watching the little green army men in Toy Story.
You had some little army men and you wanted to build a parachute.
We grabbed plastic bag after plastic bag and try to build a parachute.
We would test them in the laundry chute and nearly kill ourselves trying to get them unstuck.
Do you remember that?
None of them worked.
Of course they didn’t.
You can’t make a parachute out of plastic bags, and even if you could, it would take a more skilled laborers than we.
More than ten years later, I still can’t build a parachute.
I try because if I don’t, who will?
You refuse the help of anyone else and as such, I must try.
And I do try, I really do.
But I don’t know how to weave or sew so anything I build does not work.
But I have to keep trying because if I don’t, then who will?
I remember the lies and the way you always said that it had been an accident.
You tripped by the fence and there was a nail.
That you broke a branch and it did not go well.
That you are learning knife tricks and sometimes your hands slip.
And then mom called and begged me find all of your little knife collection while you went away for a while.
Now I watch and build parachutes in the hopes that at least one of them is enough to break your fall if you one day decide that little green army men won’t cut it anymore.
Parachutes can’t have holes or they don’t work.
That is why none of our early attempts worked.
But nets can have holes, so I try build those too.
I used to build them out wool and try to catch things you threw with them, do you remember?
They were ugly things that always broke.
Nets are a bit easier to build, all they have to do is catch.
It’s okay if the net breaks as long as it catches.
Who cares if the net breaks?
I try to make nets for you even when you get mad that I don’t trust you.
I’m not much better at making them now than when we were little.
Still, I must try and try and hope that it will be enough.
After all, if I stop, who will try to catch you?
Your new hobby is walking on a tightrope.
You barely keep your balance and always barely make it across.
I watch from the sidelines as you go across.
You sometimes ask me to come up and try.
That it will be easier to talk if I go up and across with you.
But I don’t know how to walk on a tightrope.
If I go up there, I will fall and who will save you then?
The tightrope you walk is only for you to walk and I can only stand below and pray you will make it across.
You sometimes do tricks on it and you always nearly fall off.
I can only watch and pray that you won’t fall.
All you have to break your fall are my parachutes and nets.
I sometimes wonder if you want to fall off and resent my parachutes and nets.
I have tried to suggest finding a professional.
Someone who actually knows how to make a parachute.
Or perhaps someone who can weave one of those deep fishing nets.
I will even take someone who can teach you to walk on a tightrope.
But you don’t want to.
You say you are a poor student and anyways, it’s not like you have fallen off yet.
That you hate that I build nets and that you think them an eyesore.
That my parachutes are fine and surely one of them is bound to work.
Professionals would just make things worse, you have said time and time again.
I can’t really understand that.
I try to understand, I really do.
But my parachutes cannot save a little green army man.
My nets can’t catch a ball without breaking.
And I can’t walk on the tightrope and make sure you don’t fall off.
My hands are bleeding from my attempts at weaving and sowing and I don’t know how much longer I can keep working.
Still, I have to continue.
After all, if I stop, who will save you?
So I will wear my hands to the bone and pray that this next parachute will work.
I will rip my hands to shreds and pray that the net will hold.
I will sit and watch and pray that you will not fall off your tightrope.
I love you, I really do.
But I can’t make parachutes and nets forever.
So I will just desperately pray that you will never need them.