The other day, at the Gelateriana Italiana, when Son, Daughter, and I were having our usual Friday ice creams, Son pulled an essay he had written out of his school bag. It was a story he’d written the week before, and had now got it back, graded.

“You gotta read what the teacher wrote,” he told me.

Unsurprisingly – both because he does tell a good story and because he hadn’t asked me to read it had it not been praise – the teacher had praised his storytelling skills, his vocabulary, and his cliffhangers.

“Congrats. This is fantastic. I guess I can take some of the credit here, after all, I did tirelessly tell you stories when you were just a small boy,” I told him.

He nodded. When Son was just a small boy, I used to tell him all kinds of stories and tales as I was riding my bike from his kindergarten back to our house. It was a good 45-minute ride, so there was a lot of time to travel into Lucky Luke’s world or to see what Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge were up to.

The storytelling began as soon as I got on my bike – which sounds simple was actually quite an ordeal due to hockey groin and a baby seat on the back – and heard Son’s familiar wish from behind me.

“Tell me a story, tell me a story, tell me a story.”

I say wish, because it sounds nicer than “command”, and his wish is my command. He turned that sentence into a song that he’d sing until he heard me say: “One day when…”.

By the time we turned the first corner Donald Duck’s phone had rung, and when we got to the biggest steel construction ever built in Sweden, the western bridge, they’d already gone off to an African safari, found oil or gold, got robbed by the Beagle Boys, and as we rolled down the bridge, I’d bring the story to a close with a sudden twist, and then say, “aaaaand… the end.”

Son liked stories so much that we couldn’t let him listen to any fairytales when he was going to bed – after we’d read to him – because he’d never fall asleep to one. He’d just lie in his bed, and stare at the ceiling, enthralled by the story – even if he had heard it a dozen times before.

So when I came to the end, he refused to accept it.

“Nope, the Beagle Boys didn’t end up in prison, because when they were being transferred there from the court, their grandma came and helped them escape. OK, there you go, continue,” he’d say.

And the story continued. I rode the bike up a hill, down a hill, past cars and past pedestrians, all the while telling a story to the boy in the back.

“The policeman who was driving the car, saw a nice old lady in the middle of the street, and when he got out of the car to help her, she hypnotized him with a secret hypnotizer…”

By the second bridge, the adventure was back in full swing, and when we got to the gas station down the road from our house, and I was out of breath, I’d try to end the story again.

“Aaaaand … the end.”

Except that of course it wasn’t. There was only once place Son gave me a break from telling a story, and that was a fairly big uphill just after the gas station, when I was trying to make it to the top without collapsing, and he preferred my not collapsing over a story.

As soon as we got to the top, though, the story was back on and it wasn’t over until we came home. By then, I had both Lucky Luke and Donald Duck, and maybe Son and Wife in the story as well. There were good guys and bad guys, kings and queens, ducks, bears, and superheroes.

As we turned the last corner, I’d bring it all into a nice finish.

“Aaaaaand … the end,” I said, stop the bike and life Son out of his seat.

I pushed the paper over the gelateria’s yellow table back to Son. He was re-reading the teacher’s praise, noddiing and smiling to himself. He was bursting with pride.

“I mean, I’m not surprised, you do write well, and you do have a great vocabulary,” I told him.

He looked up from the paper, and smiled at me.

“Also, it helps me that you use words like ‘tirelessly’,” he said.

I should have come up with a synonym for that, but I didn’t because my brain was filled with emotions of pride – both for my vocabulary and for Son’s willingness to give credit to me – and my tongue was tied.

“Thanks,” I said.

Aaaaaand … the end.