I told my boy to scout the offshoot trail below that hugged the creekbank. We’d take the path on higher ground. He toyed with his walking stick through the leaves that looked like copper mounds of pennies along the trail.
I saw it first and shouted down at him. His back straightened, and he looked back at me for the ok. Rung by rung he stepped up to the last two boards. “Don't mind anyone but yourself,” I said, and he climbed all the way up the tree.
I’ll spend the rest of my life at doorways with my son, the door latches clicking open, watching him slowly walk through. Fifteen feet high up a tree yesterday, he was on top of the world, climbing a stairway to wonder.
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