Walking Among Birds

by Matthew Hickson

  I hope that you will have the courage to believe in the sun even when it’s not shining, the bravery to believe in love even when you’re not feeling it, and the faith to believe in God even when He appears to be silent. But most of all, I hope, if you are ever unhappy with the person you’ve become, that you will have the power to start again and to become who you want to be.

  There is a reason why love is represented as a flame. Even a single hair casts a shadow, but a flame has no shadow at all.

  Fr. Culpa

  Perhaps upon reading this book, someone will ask why I wrote it. I guess this will be my answer: my name is Jack Lapin and when I was a fifteen-year-old boy, I met a greedy, selfish, nasty little kid. But through a happy fault, a felix culpa, he became a shining beacon of the purest light. He wasn’t the light, but merely a reflection of it, just as the moonlight is merely a reflection of the sun. He was the kindest, smartest, most tenacious person you’d ever meet. He could sort out his life by six a.m., and then go about his day solving all the world’s problems, one small act of kindness at a time. He could run and not grow tired, walk and not be faint. He could soar on wings like an eagle. And us mere mortals who trod beside him on his journey? Well, we never felt as if we were walking among birds, we felt like we were flying right by their side with them.