before hearing this story, you need to know one small detail about anthony: he vigorously contends that he is a robot, or at least that he has robotic innards. anytime i compliment him for doing something surprising or impressive his countenance sinks in frustration and he says, "dad, i keep telling you, i can do those kinds of things because i'm a robot. why can't you remember that?" and i apologize and say i forgot to which he gives an exasperated huff and moves on as if wondering how a boy robot got saddled with such an lacking human parent.

now the story. we were at our city park for alex's soccer game. bella was sitting on the bleachers reading. i was on the sidelines helping coach. marty was chatting with a friend and anthony was killing time on the playground. at one point marty looked over and saw anthony crossing a tall set of monkey bars. given their height she kept an eye on him. he had shimmied up the vertical upright to get started but once across, his legs couldn't reach the other upright or the top rung of the ladder. seeing him struggle marty ran over to help but before she got there, his grip gave and he fell, landing on his side in a hard, horizontal thud. given the height and the awkward landing, marty feared the worst.

when she crouched down next to him he pushed himself to a sitting position. marty asked if anything was hurt he. he grabbed his side and marty rubbed it testing his response. finding none, she commented that he was lucky he didn't break anything. in response, he explained that his side is his "metalist" part.

a few more feats like that and i may start giving some credence to the boy's claims of robotic componentry.