This is a chapter from my fourth book called When hunger yearns
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| The broken kite by Hassan Voyeau |
I had this idea. I would open the pen-up app and close my eyes and just draw random lines and then fill the random shapes formed with color. But what does my new art piece represent? I used Google lens and found that the closest match pointed to a gallery with a mixture of kites and vector art. Then it occured to me that it looks just like a broken kite. A kite that had gotten stuck in a tree and was pulled down but got broken and damaged in the process. It also kinda looks like a fish that got damaged too. Maybe it is a fish kite. I was reading about the history of the kite. The exact origin is unknown but it is believed that they were flown in China more than 1000 years ago. One suggestion is that a Chinese farmer tied a string to his hat to prevent it from flying off and that is how the first kite was born. In Japan they celebrate Children's Day with fish shaped kites called koinobori. Koi is a Carp type of fish. Legend has it that a Carp fish swam upstream to turn into a dragon. Because Carp fish can swim upstream they represent strength and courage. This has me thinking. What is the highest a kite could fly? According to the Guinness Book of World Records the highest kite was flown by Robert Moore over a sheep farm in Australia. The height reached was 16,009 feet.
I like this quote by Friedrich Nietzsche, "A broken kite teaches you more about the wind than a whole one ever could." Friedrich was a German philosopher. He started as a classical philologist before turning to philosophy. I had no idea that philology was a thing before today. I read that a philologist is a type of linguist who studies the history of languages, especially by looking closely at literature. They are also known as collectors of words and their etymologies. I found another Friedrich quote. "The higher we soar, the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly." I asked my friend Gemini to explain this quote to me. Gemini tells me that you should not be discouraged if others don't understand your ambitions. Keep striving for your goals. He goes on to caution that just because you have achieved more doesn't mean you should look down on others. I think everyone will experience the highs and lows of life. We learn ambition and humility in the process. One day we are flying high and one day we are the broken kite. Life is a test that is full of questions. We may ask why? We aim for the sky only to one day return to the ground when we say our last goodbye. The higher a kite flies, the more it feels the pull of the string. Even with great heights and ambitions, we are still connected to something that keeps us grounded.
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