Go Fly a Kite

The local Kiwanis organized a kite flying event on a flat plot of dry grass off Louisiana Avenue. When we got there a half hour after it started, the area was dotted with people of every description running with their strings, trying to catch a gust of wind. There were Latinas advising kid sisters, South Asian kite runners passing the secret lore along to grandchildren, serious people flying large, multicolored worm-shaped kites, and others who arrived empty handed and were trying to get the hang of it with the small, silvery butterflies the Kiwanis was distributing. There were no engines growling, no concession stands, no loudspeaker system, and only one disconsolate two- year old. Everyone was looking up. Everyone was lifted by the breeze, by the endless variety of kite colors and designs, by the joyous, unstructured playfulness. What’s wrong with this picture?

Photo by Caleb Hernandez Belmonte on Unsplash

Normally, the culture does not permit intermingling, especially in non-competitive situations. If people are going to be interacting with strangers, especially strangers speaking different dialects, there had better be a soccer game, someone keeping score. People generally stay on their side of the street. They are more likely to be wary of others than openly curious. They identify with their own tribe. We even use that word, tribe, glibly as if it weren’t an anthropological category. If you move to a new city, you set out in search of your tribe. Everyone understands this. Grown men and women behave like seventh graders, clinging to the familiar, shutting out anyone they perceive to be other. They act like dogs pissing in particular spots to mark their territory. Sometimes these boundaries are unmarked but clearly understood. When I was growing up, we walked west from the front door on 83rd street, never east to Amsterdam Avenue where men speaking Spanish sat on the stoops.

In Trader Joe’s I notice a thirtysomething woman in a shapeless dress with a scarf over her hair. She’s keeping one eye on a boy of about eight wearing a kippah and tzitzit hanging out of his shirt. Further down the aisle, two girls I take to be his sisters are following with their shopping carts. These two are in long-sleeved tops and mid-calf length skirts met by high socks. It’s almost summer but they are entirely covered. Their outfits identify them as girls who do not dye their hair blue or watch netflix. It occurs to me that they resemble the East African women in hijabs and black robes more than any everyday midwest middle schooler. They have drawn an eruv around themselves. They keep themselves separate.

People want you to know who they are. They want you to know that they are not alone in the world. They have compatriots that will defend them against intrusions. And they dress accordingly. They eat accordingly. If they play very loud hip hop at the lake, you will know not to challenge them. There is safety in this behavior, even if it’s illusory. All these people are playing out their lives in 2023 Minnesota against a backdrop of gun violence, draught, and economic uncertainty. If they are from the dominant culture, they may not even realize they are segregating themselves. White people in the mainstream believe that their consciousness is the national culture. My grandson says that Linden Hills, a charming enclave in southwest Minneapolis near where I now live, smells like the Berkshires where I used to live. This could be the aroma of freshly baked lemon ginger scones or it could be something more subtle. Education. Savings accruing in bank accounts. We can’t see our own faces except in a mirror and we can’t really smell ourselves. It’s just the air we breathe. Sometimes that air becomes stale from endless recycling, from the infrequency of breezes from outside the fortress we live in.

Opportunities to go fly a kite are few and far between. I submit that these are precious gardens in time that require watering and special care and I’m uneasy with the ongoing rejection of any commonality. In 2021, Columbia University held six identity-based commencement ceremonies, one for Native Americans, one for LGBTQ students, one for Asians, one for Latinx, one for Black students, and one for first-generation graduates from low-income families. It seems that it’s easier to revert to a dolled up Little Rock than to do the hard work of showing up on a level playing field with a dragonfly on a string.

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