Rev.A.J. Ogden

As a child growing up, I was watching the bigger boys and was fascinated with the multi-colored kites they were flying. The town kids had money to buy the ten or fifteen cents ready made kites of pretty colors! We poor kids could not buy even a dime model, but tried to make them out of newspaper glued together with home made flour dough glue. It wasn’t much but it was all that fit my budget.

One town boy could fly two or three kites all at one time and the kites seemed to be perfectly synchronized. The boy could control all three so well, and it was so amazing to me. I did well to even control one at a time, and sometimes it would come crashing down in spite of all my expertise or the lack of it! I never became the expert he was, although I tried. One thing I did learn about a kite; it all depends on the man with the string control in his hand. The kite always seems to be tugging at the string trying to get away. But on its own it would have a crash landing. The following is a poem I read as a child, and I don’t recall the author’s name.

The Kite: Or Pride Must Have A Fall

Were I but free, I would take a flight,

And pierce the clouds beyond their sight.

But, ah, like a poor prisoner bound,

My string confines me near the ground.

And as you might know, the kite does finally manage to tug itself free, but instead of soaring higher, crashes to the ground in a complete loss. We can’t do anything without our matchless Master!