The sofa, the crate and the tree.

Saturday

After a bowl full of cornflakes, a spoonful of sugar and a glass of milk, an ingenious idea entered my head. It struck me as l looked at the milk left inside the pint sized glass milk bottle. My attention diverted to the weatherman on telly who said that we should make full use of the sunny day outside because it would rain thunderstorms by dawn the following day.
I walked to my local shop and whistled nonchalantly beside the milk crates outside the shop window. I looked left and then right. I picked up a crate and ran away with it. I ran all the way to the park. I placed the crate beside Oak Tree 1. I jumped from atop the crate. I was closer to the branch now then yesterday but not close enough.
I had seen a sofa thrown out onto the streets on my way to the park that very morning. It was less than a street away. It was a good thing that the sofa had wheels as it was monstrously heavy. Pushing it through the single street and across the park in full view of the people taking their dogs for its morning walk, I remember thanking the person who invented wheels. So simple an idea yet so very helpful. If you think about it, it made the impossible possible. Without wheels, you wouldn't have trolleys or cars or airplanes. I repeat, without the invention of wheels you wouldn't have airplanes. I wondered how many people think to realize that.
Any thoughts of me being the cleverest eleven year old in the world vanished when I reached Oak Tree One. The sofa was two crates high. The bounce on the sofa let me reach higher but not high enough. I thought about my problem. The problem was height. The sofa was only two crates high. I then realized that the sofa was at least six crates in width. If only I could switch the dimension to my favour. I have to put the sofa on its side I realized. How was I going to lift the sofa? More and more I realised the importance of the rope. I crafted a few imaginative solutions to my problem with the use of rope. But it was one of the many things that I did not have in my possession.
I walked away from the site so that I could see the problem from another perspective. It was a long shot but I was running out of ideas. I sat down on a park bench close by. A man in his thirties was already sitting on one corner of the bench. I saw a used needle beside his feet. He asked me what I was doing with the sofa, the crate and the tree. I told him. He asked why I was trying to climb the tree and that it didn't make sense. I replied: That’s like asking why an adult would want to climb Mount Everest. He then asked whether I was afraid of failure? Well, I suppose I do really want to climb to the top and so would be disappointed if I didn't but what a warped way to look at things. I said, this is how I think: Wouldn't it be brilliant to climb to the top of Oak Tree 1.
I refocused on the tree. How on earth do I lift up the sofa? All of a sudden, the man walked off in haste towards Oak Tree 1. He lifted up the sofa with ease. He came back and warned me of the consequences of climbing the tree. If I fall I could break my neck and sit paralysed in a wheel chair for the rest of my life. Or worse, die. He then said that it was disrespectful to people less fortunate then I am. That part I did not understand. He left saying that I should follow this road, fully aware of risks at hand.
I went to fetch a few more crates and made a stair case to the peak of mount sofa. I reached the branch and I climbed to the second branch. As I climbed to the top, I kept thinking about what the man who helped me in the morning said. I looked down at the ground. It was a long way down.... in a fit of both sadness and fear, I climbed down slowly. I pushed the sofa over to stop other fools from doing what I very nearly did. I took one last look at Oak Tree 1. I left the park in despair.
End of day two