A Leap of Faith

by Hugh Herbert

In the summer of 1938 we used to go to  the Saturday afternoon movies in Mystic.  The films were always accompanied by a serial and, for a while, it was “Flash Gordon” who flew through the air using a long cape.

I thought that this was pretty neat.  I then had a brilliant idea!  I went into the kitchen closet and took out Dad’s large, rubberized raincoat and took it up to my bedroom and climbed out the window to the kitchen roof.  There, I donned the coat, which came down to my ankles and buttoned the top few buttons and walked to the edge of the roof.  I leaned down and gathered the bottom corners at the front of the coat and held them wide apart and—–dove head first off the roof.

It turned out that MY cape was of little use and I did a great belly-flop on the ground!  So, I’m lying there, gasping for breath, nearly choking to death when Paul comes over.  Leaning down, not to help as I thought, but to holler “I’m going to tell Dad that you took his coat!”

Good old Paul and our sibling rivalry!