The
Breaking Truth
The sound of the school bells were
ringing through my ears. Chairs began to slide backwards across the floor as
many feet trampled the ground and were beginning to run for the closest exit
doors. My classmates’ excited and cheering voices overcame our teacher’s
friendly reminder to not forget that homework was due Monday at the beginning
of class. School was over for the week! It was finally the weekend and all the
kids were going crazy talking about what they were going to be doing. I had
overheard some of my classmates saying they were leaving to Arizona to go
camping with their parents and even some of my friends told me they had plans
to go hunting with their dad or go visit their cousins for a day or two. In
fact, my twin brother and I had just been talking earlier in class about the
plans for the weekend and brainstorming all the options of what we could do.
As we were walking through the
halls on our way to get picked up by our dad in front of school, we decided we
wanted to do something out of the normal and make something! This something had
to be really fun and entertaining, something that not a lot of our friends have
done before, and something we could do with our dad since we wanted to spend
time with him. Our dad is a fixer-upper kind of guy and I’d like to think he
uses his hands to fix just about anything and everything. Actually, I am almost
positive he hasn’t met a challenge in which he wasn’t able to fix it. Anyways,
our dad was there waiting for my brother and me in the car to pick us up and
take us back to the house to enjoy the weekend. My brother, Sean, rushed to the
car and opened the door as fast as he could so as to jump in and tell our dad
about what we wanted to do for the weekend. Once I sat down in the backseat, I
heard Sean come up with the bright idea of jumping off the house and onto the
trampoline in the backyard which would then launch his butt into the pool. As
soon as he said this, my dad gave him this look as if he were out of his mind.
There was no way in the world my dad would let Sean and I risk our lives doing
that! So, my dad turned on the car and started on our way home.
Once back at the house, after some
hard and thoughtful brainstorming, I came up with the idea of making our own
homemade zip line and putting it in the backyard. How cool is that! I immediately yelled out the
idea to my dad and brother and they actually thought it was a great idea and
could be pretty easy to put together! All the materials we needed were stored
away in my dad’s garage. Now how perfect was this going to be! Once inside the
house, we threw our backpacks into our rooms and ran to the garage to start
helping our dad put together the zip line. It was fairly easy and all we really
needed was a long rope, a pulley, handle, ladder, and two end points in which
we could tie the device to.
It was such a beautiful Friday
afternoon. The sun was out and it wasn’t too hot outside. Spring was my
favorite time of year because I could do everything outdoors and go around
exploring the outside world. The leaves on the trees ranged from a dark green
to a bright yellowish color which caught my eyes as I was climbing up the
ladder to reach the top of the zip line. My dad had tied one end to the top of
our biggest tree and the other end extended all the way to the other side of
the backyard which was tied to a sturdy fence. At the time, the backyard was
almost an acre big entirely filled up with lush green grass and tall, healthy
trees were spotted throughout. This was going to be the best start to the weekend.
Nothing could be better than enjoying time with family and being out of school
for the weekend. I couldn’t wait until my mother got home from work because I
wanted to show her what we had all built in the backyard! Once I reached the
top of the ladder and tree, I grabbed hold of the pulley, secured my grip, and
pushed off immediately gliding down the rope. I felt the wind rush through my
hair and hit my face at high speed as I hit top speed. I could see my legs
getting nearer and nearer to touching the ground which meant I was getting
close to the end of the line. As soon as my feet started dragging across the
grass I let go and did and small tumble to the ground and safely landed back up
on my feet without a scratch. By far the best homemade zip line my dad could
have helped make for Sean and I!
We were having such a blast on this
new toy of ours. The backyard had never seemed this fun before! Round after
round of sliding down the rope to end in a tumble over the grass was going on
for over an hour now. It was Sean’s turn to go and I remember him ascending the
ladder getting higher and higher away from me as he was reaching the top of the
tree. Sean, at the time, was about four feet tall had a scrawnier and skinnier build. He also
had a more oval face with a defined, slightly pointed chin and a sturdy jaw
line. A narrow, oblong face with angular cheekbones made up his face. His bright blue eyes are small and
spaced evenly apart, sitting just below his blonde eyebrows
that curve as a natural extension of his broad, slim nose. A pair of dark
rimmed glasses sat in between his shaggy blonde hair
and mellow ears. Sean gave off this bright face full of excitement and his quirky expression
showed a sense of immense happiness as he made it to the top of the zip line. He
was having so much fun with me and we couldn't have had a better time with our
dad. Sean grabbed the handle connected to the pulley, held on tight, and
as he pushed off his gliding decent immediately changed to a quick falling. Right
away the knot the pulley was connected to slipped undone and he started his
fall to meet the bottom of the tree. Sean fell right onto his arm making a loud
thud as his body weight pressed his forearm into the biggest tree root
protruding out of the ground.
My dad was on the other side
of the fence in our neighbor’s yard watering their flowers and playing with
their two dogs at the point of this happening. Once he heard the loud noise of
my brother crashing to the ground and the root snapping his arm in half, he
turned around and took off in a quick sprint towards my brother, hopped the
fence, and picked my brother up and quickly told me to go to the car to unlock
the doors. Sean was put into the backseat with me holding onto a big back of
ice covering his arm. As I looked over closer, I could see his middle forearm
had sunken in as if it was creating a big wave or a letter “U”. My dad has
never driven so fast before. It was as if he was Vin Diesel on a critical
mission in Fast and Furious and he
had to save the world. With one hand on the wheel, and the other holding his
phone to his ear, my mother’s voice started yelling from the phone and that’s
when I knew my dad had just explained to her that one of her babies had
completely smashed and broke their arm in half! Wow, what a day this turned out
to be!
After waiting in the
hospital, my brother’s arm was in a sling and he had a huge smile across his
face again just like the one he had right before he took off from the ladder.
My mom had left work and was at the hospital too now, alongside my brother
giving my dad some nice, loving glares and she held Sean close to her. My
family and I spent the rest of our Friday evening back at the house making sure
Sean was cared for and my dad and I were lucky enough to get out of the house
away from my very concerned and distraught mother taking down the zip line and
to never set it up again (her orders…!). After all, my dad probably should have
asked her for permission to set up the zip line in the backyard first. He does
deserve some credit though for two things: first for turning down Sean’s first
idea of jumping off the roof and secondly for giving me a memory I will never
forget. Overall, Sean breaking his arm was a learning experience for me and my
family. The truth is, just because something bad happened to Sean, we both
still enjoyed our homemade experience zip lining and still today, want to ride
the longest zip line in the world!
