Soaring on eagles' wings

The anticyclonic frost and cold of the beginning of March has become cyclonic bluster and low cloud. I took advantage of some nice force 5-ish south-westerlies, and reached for my kite again. Kite flying is an excellent way to stand and stare, soar on eagles' wings, forget about earthly matters and ride the breeze. All very good for the soul and the spirit. Why else would the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences have the Mary Poppins lyrics on its website?

I have a stunt kite, and usually just do aerobatics: as many tight 360° as possible; skim the ground without crashing; try and trace out a neat square; S's and figures of eight; fly it as close to the wind as possible (I estimate about 30° either side of the wind direction); bounce it off the ground and recover (also known as crashing); and so on. But today I spent some time just letting it fly, as a tell-tale of how the wind was changing direction, or blowing harder (almost overhead) and softer (fell out of the sky). Then I stopped watching it, and just felt it through the strings and my hands instead. And I got an even clearer sense of the gradual strengthening and fading of the wind, the sudden pull with a gust, and especially the turbulence, the sudden juddering pull-pull-pull followed by relaxation. I have a new respect for how the kestrel can hover over a single spot.

And then the wind got up, and the kite pulled hard. So I ended with some more aerobatics and crashes, and one final spectacular vertical nosedive. 20/30 minutes standing and staring, 10 minutes winding up the string and tail.