funny how a million things need to be done desperately when one is stuck to a sick bed.
day two of this surprisingly stinging intestinal flu. and my list of stuff to be done just got longer and harder to contemplate being accomplished.
drive to atlantic city for the regine velasquez concert. steep that strange herbal tea. drop off that chest high laundry pile to the only laundromat open on a sunday. inform anybody with a stake on one’'s finances that one is not feeling too hot. do a draft of one'’s will. fly a kite.
from my window, i could see the sun outside just showing off. what an ostentatious prick.
and on the next block, one near the italian mortuary, one skinny boy, harassed by an occasional kibitzing adult (his father? his molesting uncle?), was flying a kite, a small, haphazardly put together, box kite.
despite his obvious tyro flying skills, the boy was able to get around them kite eating power lines. and despite the light wind, he was able to high launch his glider first by propping it up against a low standing road sign then reeling in his line hand over hand like a manic fisherfolk.
as soon as his glider gained altitude, the boy was up there in the sky with it. he was beaming, he was yelling unintelligibly, he was babbling. he was king of the world.
as in most of life'’s profoundest pleasures, the rewards of kite flying depend not so much as to the understanding of the science behind it.
kites fly because the trifecta of mutually opposing physical forces of lift, drag, and gravity (no gay words, here) conspire to work together.
as wind moves across the sail of a kite, a necessary pressure is created. from this, lift is deflected along the face of the kite.
the wind then pushes up on the kite like an all reaching hand, cradling it up in the sky. at the same time, wind blowing over the top of the kite creates an area of low pressure, a vacuum that effectively pulls the glider from behind.
i have a feeling that invalids and shut ins are the most envious of creatures, painfully desirous of the advantages of the well and vibrant.
for i was, looking at this kid. i was jealous of his vim, his vigor, his youth, his smile, his happiness. most of all, i am green with his ambition.
to fly, to be airborne, to be aloft. to give in to the restlessness inside. to leave behind all our confining presents.
to joy in kiting is to revel in this exquisite sense of extension. this almost foolish sense that somehow the sky is within our grasp, that the sky somehow strangely starts from our feet.
at one time, the boy’'s kite took this flashy dip and almost grazed my window.
i was breathless. like somebody just told me a secret, a life changing one.