May 2, 2004
Kites
Once upon a time I used to fly the hell out of kites. My friends and I would go to the cliffs on Skidaway Island (the same fields they used to film the African scenes in Roots) and soar some birds. The winds there were steady, and magnificent. We would have 8 or 10 kites up, way up, and would scramble when a line separated.
THAT is the part of kiting no one reminds you of. Lines do break, and a kite might stagger and fall for several miles while you attempt to react, and determine its downpath.
I was in my early twenties then, and it's shameful to admit it, but there was not a lot of money to be had to spend on a kite. If you had a nice one (mine was a bat kite for most of these endeavours) you tried to keep it. I spent a lot of time chasing a fallen kite. I lost one or two, but I always seemed to find the Bat Kite. My friends and I were fans of the film Quest For Fire, and those co-opted ululations were used to great effect to notify each other of a kite's recovery.
I tried to get the girls interested in kites once, but they have the attention span of sand gnats. They love kites, but they are not into the maintenance of a kite. String is critical, of course, and one must nurture the kite itself. Replenish crossmembers, where necessary, and redo the tail (prevailing winds on a given day determine the length and scope of a tail).
Tomorrow promises to be sunny, and windy, at 5 to 7 knots, from the south-south-east. I may try a launch.
By the way, as an update: those prostitutes on the beach, with their tricked out dancers, aren't real kiters. They are wind muppets, nothing more or less. Anyone can fly a kite at the beach, for God's sake. And they fly so low. Fuckarounds. A good kite should be so high you can't determine its place of birth.