Icarus's Memory: the mother bird

"Now tell me, Icarus. Do you how birds fly?" Icarus's mother asked.

"They flap their wings real hard so the wind accumulates and carry them," Icarus replied. "That's what master said in class."

"That is true, but that isn't the whole answer," her mother said. She patted him, a sign he did well. "There are other two answers: one, the wind, the sky and everything else that surrounds the bird understands him and himself understands them. Do you know how it works, Icarus?"

Icarus paused for a while, she couldn't understand what her mother is saying.

"Think of a person listen to a music, if he stands still or sit idly while listening, won't something be missing?" asked his mother. "Imagine it vividly, try to taste in your mind the alluring voice of most love tone. Won't you want to do something?"

"Dance?" Icarus answered.

"Exactly, it's an embodiment of harmony. And you won't be only moving in any manner. You will flow along the music's rhythm," explained his mother. "Now, do you now understand how the birds can fly?"

"No," Icarus answered honestly. "I don't understand it."

Her mother patted his head once again and smile.

"In time you'll understand it," she said.

"But what of the other answer? You did said there are two other answers, right?" Icarus asked. His eyes were brimming in glee. He does not understand any of what her mother is saying but he loves moment when they converse.

"Oh! Silly me, I almost forgot. The other answer is more concerned not on how a bird fly but on why. But I don't think you will understand it even if I tell it to you," she said.

"No, I'm going to understand it. Please tell me," he said.

"Well, it mostly concern the mother birds. When a mother bird feels her youngling is ready for the sky, she'll force him to leave. She'll even push them away from their tree top nest," her mother explained.

"But isn't that cruel?" asked Icarus aghast.

"Now, Icarus, don't think of it as cruelty. It is for her young one. In order for him to feel and understand the flight. The fear of height and getting injured on the way down, the audience leaves and branches that will watch and laught at the young one's decent and the exhilirating wind that tries hard to lift him up but may or may not fail in the end. All of which constitute in the bird's understanding of everything that surrounds him," her mother explained.

Of course, Icarus didn't understand any of it.

"But it is still cruel for her to abandon her child," Icarus sadly said. A sudden fear of abandon awoke in his mind.

"I didn't say that," she said.

"You said that she will push her child away?" Icarus asked, he was about to cry.

"No mother bird will ever abandon her young chick. If the mother bird feels something isn't right, she will immediately go to her young ones and carry them all back home to their tree top nest," she said and gave Icarus a hugged. "Up on their nest, the mother bird will give her child a big hug. She'll tell him that everything will be alright and her child could stay with her until they could finally learn to fly."

"Will you be like the mother bird?" Icarus asked.

"Of course, Icarus, I won't leave you," her mother said. Icarus tightened his hug on her.