Illegally flying a kite in Provincetown

25.07.2008

I woke up a little early, ready to tackle the day. First on the agenda was finding a kite to take to the beach. I am a woman of simple needs! The plan was to head to the very tip of Massachusetts, Provincetown to be specific. Ohhh the beach.

We stopped in at Target, and went down to the back of the store where the toys were. The lady there knew exactly where the kites were. She snatched this tiny packet from a hook on the wall and proudly held it out to me. I immediately blurted out, "That's not a kite!" and she retored just as urgently, "Yes it is!". So I reluctantly took it from her hand with a quick suspicious glance. The little round packet indeed, was a kite. A kite with a giant smiling Elmo, yes, but a kite nonetheless. Amazing.

It was a kite with no wooden dowels included! How would it fly? Would it even work? I was still skeptical, but I had faith in the outlandish claims of the kite manufacturers. How could they sell these things if they didn't fly? Right?

So, off we went, Mike picked up (ugh) some Starbucks, and before I knew it, we were following signs that said "Cape Cod". After a couple of them, I clued in that we might actually be going to the infamous Atlantic region.

"Cape Cod?! Is that here?!" "Yeah, that's where we're going." "Are you KIDDING me?!" "Nope, it's the very tip of Massachusetts." "It's CAPE COD?!" "Yep." "OMG I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO GO THERE, AWESOME!" "Well, now you will." "Woowwwwwwwww coooooooooollllllll" And on and on it went...

We eventually hit a bunch of traffic and I quickly bot bored, so I decided to test out the new kite. Everytime the car went more than four feet, the kite took off, exactly as kites are supposed to. This was so exciting for me. The Elmo kite marketing guys didn't lie after all! I would be flying a kite at the beach in no time!

I was laughing my head off, flying my kite out the window of the Honda Civic. I think I was the only one to find it funny. People in the other cars did NOT look nearly as amused as I was.

As the car stopped, however, tragedy struck. The gren plastic tail became lodged under the wheels of the car, and the kite took off the next time Mike hit the gas. Ohhhhhhh no, you know what's coming. The kite tail ripped right off. What to do? I was convinced it wouldn't fly, so I immediately began to fashion a new kite tail from an old Target bag. The new tail was just as beautiful, and Mike had some tape in the trunk. My plan to fly a kite was not doomed after all. Phew!

More and more driving brought us to the big giant Cape Cod sign, wow, it's crazy that I had absolutely no idea that Cape Cod was in Massachusetts. It had seemed to me, just a magical, mythical place, somewhere on the shores of the Atlantic. We passed places like the "Lobster Shanty" and every restaurant had some form of cartoon lobster on the front of their fine establishment. There were all KINDS of kite and beach toy stores around here. Wow, was I a lucky duck.

We kept driving to the edge of America, until we got to the very end. I forget the name of the beach we stopped at, but they are all nice around there, so it doesn't really matter. The surrounding area was like nothing I'd ever seen before. There were all kinds of weirdly shaped bushes sprouting out of the white sand which made up the rolling dunes. Seriously, it was like another planet. OK OK OK! So we paid $15 and drove around and around the full parking lot. Finally, we found a secret hidden empty parking lot. OK OK OK!!! Kite flying time! Wooo! I was all set to fix my kite's tail, but it was windy enough, so I started to fly it on the way to the beach from the parking lot. It was going great. Elmo flew high in the sky... Then, what do I see but a sign that says "NO KITE FLYING" among other ridiculous prohibitions such as "NO PETS" etc. I was totally flabberghasted. What human being with any kind of soul would tell someone they couldn't fly a kite on the beach? Godddddddd. Other people were flying kites on the beach, so there was no way I was going to pack up my fun and go home! No.... way... I am SUCH a badass. Ohhh....man.... (Antonia)

So yes, I flew my kite on the beach. Not on the rocks, but that's OK. The beach was pretty busy. There were old gay men playing with their dogs and really serious beachers, lounging under pop up shelters. People had also parked their RVs and motor boats up on the dunes. But kites... not allowed... REALLY?

My mission officially complete, I grew weary of flying my kite so I gave it to Mike. He said it was "quite enjoyable". Good. I decided to continue walking down the beach to see what was around the corner, it turns out more beach. It was almost deserted just a few metres away . The beach was absolutely full of broken fish bones, gross! The water was a little cool, but the day was hot, so as soon as we were out of sight, I changed into my bathingsuit...my laziness knows no bounds!.... and jumped in. I was sooooooo terrified of coming into contact with fish, and I felt the ocean just sucking me into the great abyss, so screaming and jumping, I sucked it up and dunked myself. Almost immediately, I got out. Mike quipped that it was like a "baptism". Oh what a witty boy. So after getting thoroughly salted up, we headed back to the car, a little tired, parched and ravenous.

We drove the rest of the way to Provincetown, had another terrible time finding a parking spot. We walked down the one main street, past men dressed up in drag advertising "tea dances" (I never found out exactly what that was) and another man with half his naked body spray painted in tie dye, advertising a body modification parlour of some sort if I'm not mistaken. He tried to charge me $1 to take my picture with him. I laughed and politely declined. Mike said he was hungry enough to eat his hand, but none of the places I wanted to go to were open until 5:30. OK, so we went to a regular looking place for some lobster on the pier/wharf/marina/whatever. Mmmm, very fresh and very good.

Oh and of course, I had to bring back some saltwater taffy. Who can resist? Not me, that's for sure. After dinner, we drove straight to Providence for pitchers at the Trinity Brew Pub. We had something called Point Break something or other, that I wanted to get just because of the name, and some sort of India Pale Ale. Also very nice. It was pretty late when we got back so I just went straight to sleep, literally, 20 seconds after my head hit the pillow. What a crazy fun day in Rhode Island and Cape Cod.

Dead fish "art"