He grew out of it.
"...and then we jumped from the shed roof onto the house, did a gert wheelie and done like a skid and stuff before we speeded off through the woods where there was like a bear that we had to kill before we could find the secret house what no one knows about 'cept us..."

Sounds like utter gibberish, doesn't it?

Yet this is just a brief sample of the 'real' stories that my younger brother would regale us with of a Saturday evening, as we ate our tea.

The breadth of wild adventures he and his friend enjoyed was truly flabbergasting, yet, as far as he tried to convince us, every one of them was entirely true.

It's encouraging that a youngster would have so vivid an imagination. Looking back on it, it is almost impressive that he dreamt up such incredible adventures, such unlikely and implausible stories.

What concerned the rest of the family, however, was his determination that these stories were real. That somewhere in his mind, fiction merged seamlessly with fact and a new reality was crafted that replaced the world in which everyone else existed.

He did grow out of it eventually, and the rest of the family now believes most of what he tells us. But I suspect that even now, somewhere in the murkiest depths of his mind, he believes he really did jump a four wheel motorbike from shed to house, do battle with a fierce bear and hide out in a secret house, located somewhere in the ancient, mystic woods.
( Moey, Tue 6 Jan 2009, 13:54, Reply)