Flying Lessons 2 Bees

The eight year old looking worried said, "I want to go outside, but I can't."


"What’s the problem?” I asked, knowing.

“Bees."

“Ah.”

“What should I do?” he looked at me for an answer.

“You should go to your room and curl up in a ball on the floor.”

He rolled his eyes and he sighed as if to say, "I know you are going to make a point".


“If your only goal is to be safe, it’s your best move. But if you want a good life, you need to spend some time figuring out which fears are worth having.”


"Bees sting. It's a fear worth having." (there's the smart guy I love)

He’s right. But I want him to learn to balance risk and reward — to recognize that too manic an obsession with safety wrings all of the fun out of life, that we too often worry about the wrong things anyway, and that a little knowledge can often do more than anything else to put fears in perspective.

So we Googled bees and why they might want to hurt us, and we found out that they don't want to after all. As we suspected, most bees die after they sting.

We also found this cool picture of a man covered with bees and he looks reasonable, right?

So why should we be afraid?

"So it looks like you you and the bee both want the same thing. Just go about your business, leave the bees alone and I'll bet they do the same."

"But what if I do get stung?"

"I have ice and medicine and hugs and ice cream."

Out he ran.

K