Kites and Writing

“A kite can’t fly without a string,” as the proverb goes to illustrate that rules don’t tie us down, but keep us up. But how true is this adage?

My friend Matt would say it’s true. You should have seen his face when he whipped open the answer key to his math homework to confirm what he already felt confident was the right answer. After laboriously studying the rules of mathematics, he’d managed to master functional inequalities. He was feeling sky-high.

The students in my italian class say it’s true. I spent an hour in a study session helping them understand the rules for direct and indirect object pronouns. Walking away they said that they felt a lot better about the concepts and I could tell that their love for the language had grown. “It’s the little rules that make italian so beautiful,” I told them. It was a feeling that was mutually understood, like a spiritual surge of emotion.

My roommates would say it’s true. “If any of you guys put up bad pictures in our apartment, it wouldn’t last a second,” one said to the rest of us. He’s convinced that maintaining high moral standards is critical to keeping high spirits. The rest of us are quick to agree.

In school, in sports, in spiritual matters, in life - rules are what make us soar. Often we seem to want the easy way out, the cheap fling, the smooth sailing. But testimonies can readily be found that the most rewarding emotions are precisely that: rewarding. They come as a prize for hard work, for diligent application, for dedicated practice and in all cases, for observance of rules.

As we talk of the rules of writing, why should it be any different? It is no surprise that we “celebrate” writers such as Shakespeare, Frost, and Tolkien. There is something we appreciate in the clarity and inspiration achieved in good writing. There is a crispness, a beauty that makes us want to try harder and to be better. There is something desirable, attractive, and praiseworthy, something we want more of.

We come to stand in awe of the kite, quickly losing from sight and memory that it is the string that makes it fly.