The Green Bag

The most amazing and spirit-lifting thing happened to me yesterday.

When Micah and Teri were making their plans to visit, they had told me that one day while they were here, they wanted to go to Daytona Beach for one day, because Marissa had asked for that for her birthday (two weeks from today). With the weather being so iffy early in the week, they decided that they’d do their six days at Disney, giving Hurricane Ike time to make up its mind about where it was going to go (those poor people in Texas).

While the Webners were enjoying their last day at Disney on Friday, I had decided that, by golly, I wasn’t going to go to Daytona Beach and not take my kite. I’d hung the flamingo mylar kite that Luanne gave me (I think even before I left California in 1974 – the flamingo was just coincidental at the time) on the west wall of the screened porch when I moved into my condo. I took it down, figuring that if the cobwebs and dust didn’t drag it down too much, it just might fly even after all these years.

So we ended up going yesterday – and it was a wonderful day for an afternoon at the beach. An almost cloudless sky, the beach and parking (yes, we drove on the beach) was available and the crowds thin – with a wonderful, steady on-shore breeze blowing ; this is the perfect time of the year to do Daytona.

I went into the ocean with the Webners for a little while, jumping waves. Then I left them to their enjoyment and launched the kite. It took off as easily as it ever has, and soon was floating high in the sky. I’ve got 30-pound test fishing line on that thing, and I could feel the pull like crazy. One little kid told me the kite was awesome; a young couple said it was “cool.” I sat down on my folding beach lounger to watch the Webners out in the water and the people passing by on the beach. Many people saw the kite and would smile at me.

As the day passed, the water came further and further up the beach; the tide was coming in. When it started lapping the edge of the blankets we had spread, we pulled everything up higher about twelve feet. The Webners went back in the water; I resumed people-watching.

I hadn’t realized our beach “camp” was now so close to the “driving area.” All at once I felt a REAL tug on the kite string. I sat up and turned around, only to see that the string had caught on the ventilation unit on top of one of the larger vending trucks that was driving north on the beach. I yelped and started yelling, which caught the attention of our beach “neighbors,” two young men and a young woman – they were Hispanic and anywhere between 17 and 23 years old (I’ve gotten over the fact that it’s really hard for me to guess ages in the range anymore).

My hollering was for naught. The truck kept on driving and the reel was trying to unwind, and the line snapped. I sat there in dismay, watching the kite being carried north on the beach by the truck. The young people next to me made some comment about that being too bad. I said, “I’ve had that sucker for 35 years,” then shrugged and added, “Easy come, easy go.”

We all watched the kite travel up the beach. About a quarter of a mile away, the kite started dipping. It appeared to have broken free from the truck. I expected it to sail off like gangbusters; unaccountably, it started a nose-dive and went down between a couple of hotels/condo buildings. There was no way I was going to trudge up the beach in that heat. Besides, it had seemed to me that it had gone down in the vicinity of the extension of Speedway Boulevard that becomes the beach access for cars. I figured that someone had had a kite fall on them from (literally) the blue. I could only hope that the recipient of this gift from the sky appreciated what he/she had been lucky enough to receive.

All of a sudden, the young man accompanying the other two, who were obviously a couple, stood up and said, “I’ll be back.” And he started trotting northward on the beach. I looked in wonder at the other two and asked, “Is he going after the kite?” Both of them shrugged and said, “I dunno.”

I opened a bottle of water, smoked a cigarette, and was re-arranging the stuff in the coolers we’d taken, when I stood up – and there was Josua, standing in front of me with the kite. I was astounded, flabbergasted, and unequivocally grateful.

I asked him if I could give him something for what he’d done. Josua said, “No. To make it possible to continue a 35 year old tradition is enough.” That’s when I asked him his name and where he is from (Seminole County, the country immediately north of Orange County, in which Orlando is located).

The kindness and graciousness of this one young man is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever experienced. I am still awed by it.

I tied the kite back onto the line I still had on the reel and launched it again. It soared, high and beautiful, and I smiled the rest of the day.