The Fun Vs Safe Tightrope

As a mum, sometimes it is hard to know where to draw the line to keep kids safe. As I write this, my two terrors are using our long, sloped driveway to see how much speed they can get up on their scooters. They're on asphalt and I gotta tell ya, they're really moving. If they fall off they're gonna split lips and take off enough skin to resurface an Egyptian mummy. But they're also having a delightful time, yelling and whooping and letting off steam levels that only mothers of little boys will really understand. It's a sight to behold.

So I'm sitting here in a quandary. Part of me is nervously chewing its nails waiting for the next trip up to the ER, while the other part is going rah-rah like a cheer squad as skills get pushed to their very edge and the boys zoom past my window faster than a flock of fishing ganets. What's a girl to do?

I figure writing is a bit the same. First we wobble, then we're tentative, then we say, "to hell with it" and push ourselves to the max letting our hearts and emotions drive us where angels fear to tread. To fully develop our abilities we must take our skills a hair's breadth from coming unstuck. If we misjudge it we'll be a mess, yet it's when we're fanging as fast and far and wild as we know how that we learn to whoop and holler and fly.