It is blustery today. I am thinking about flying kites. I first flew kites with my Dad and my Uncle Ed at Chimborazo Park in Church Hill. It was the site of the largest military hospital in the world during the time of the American Civil War.

We bought Hi-Flier kites. They were paper and they were cheap. They were tricky to fly, so we needed people like my Dad and Uncle to show us how to get them airborne. They had patience and experience and we did not.

It never occurred to us that Daddy and Ed had been to Hell and back and that, to them, flying kites with your children was one of the great joys of life. Maybe that’s why Dad flew kites at the beach with his grandchildren thirty years later.