Occasion | Cyane Kramer

Last week I bought a kite; a silk, hand-painted, eagle kite. However, that doesn’t alter the childlike thrill I felt at the prospect of flying it. That’s all I wanted, and that’s all I bought it for. The other facts about it were just frills on the edges.

Immediately I set out to find an empty field, which was unusually difficult considering it was a Wednesday afternoon. I finally discovered a small corner plot of grass, upon which resided a sparse community of petite trees that could easily be avoided. Ignoring the fact that the wind had died a little, I stubbornly set at tying the strings and raising the eagle. I ran, I jumped, and I received compliments on the kite from passerby. Despite all these factors, I couldn’t get the wings to take to the air. Disappointed, I finally admitted defeat for the day; after all, even as a child I was never the one to get the kite into the air. That was the job of my brothers or father, who occasionally would let me hold the string, but who would retrieve it from my grasp at the slightest falter in flight.

My family isn’t with me down here. They’re two hundred or more miles away, busy with keeping their own business in the air. I’ll have to learn to tie my own strings, and heave that kite into the air if I want to fly. That’s my business. I’m not perfect at it, but I’ll keep running and jumping. I’ll find the available plot with the least impediments where I can work best and hope that, someday, I can learn to fly that eagle on my own.