I saw it coming . . .

You know, I saw this one coming. I should have put a stop to it, but I didn't.

Sure, I threw out a half-hearted, "Sonwun, that's probably not a great idea." But in hindsight, I should have done more. I should have taken the rope, the harness and the rocks and put them away, in a safe place.

So when I heard the screaming from the front lawn, I had a pretty good idea of what awaited me outside. It was the kind of screaming that tells you something is seriously wrong. No one threw sand at someone else. No one took someone's toy. No one was looking out someone else's window.

No, this was the real thing.

Sonwun loves trees. He loves to climb them, hang from them, break branches from them and find bugs in them. He also loves ropes. He loves to tie things to ropes and drag them around. And he has combined these loves on our front lawn.

Using his mother's rock-climbing harness, he will toss a rope up over a branch and actually haul himself up to said branch to get into the tree. I'm actually proud of this. It takes some effort and he keeps at it until he succeeds. I know it's dangerous, but I've watched him do it and he's pretty careful.

But he also likes to tie the rope around large rocks and try to haul them up into the air. I've seen this. I've sent out the half-hearted warning. But I should have done more.

Last night, after supper, he tied up a 20-pound rock and began hauling. It apparently reached a branch about 7 feet up before it broke loose. And it fell. And it landed on his little foot. And it smashed that little foot, breaking at least two bones, possibly three. (The radiologist wasn't in last night.)

I am thanking God today that the rock landed on his foot and not on his head. And not on Sontoo's head, as Sontoo was playing under the same tree.

I'm also thanking God that Sonwun's a normal, adventurous boy. He doesn't shy away from challenges, he continues to ask himself, "what happens if . . ." and then works to answer that question, minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day. It's not a bad way to live.

But I guess that, maybe a little more often, I need to step in and answer the question for him. The answer this time, I knew, was "The rock will eventually break free and fall. And you better not be under it when it does, because it will do some damage."

And I guess that this is one of the fine lines of fatherhood. I've got to figure out when to answer the question and when to let him figure it out on his own. I think I dropped the ball on this one.

Anyhoo, it's still dark out now, but when the sun rises I plan to take pictures of the victim, the offender and the crime scene. And maybe I'll post them tomorrow.

It's 5:45 a.m. and both boys are already up. Sonwun has a hard splint on his foot, and I've been told he's not allowed to put weight on it for two or three weeks. So, in the next few days, we'll be testing out the crutch thing. Sonwun's mentioned that Uncle John used crutches when he hurt his foot, so he's anxious to give it a go.

As for me, I need to take a deep breath, be thankful for guardian angels and let him keep asking himself questions and experimenting to find answers. But I think I will answer just one for him. "NO, you are not going down the stairs with those crutches! Because I'm your father and because I said so."