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A Sunday afternoon in early March found me enjoying the warm sun on my deck and an intriguing book “Hemingway in Cuba.”

It had recently arrived in the mail as a token of thanks for speaking to the Kernersville Friends of the Library. I had mentioned to this group that I was reading “A Farewell to Arms,” and someone must have assumed that I was an avid fan of Ernest Hemingway.

In fact, I knew little about the man and had read only one of his many books, “The Old Man and the Sea.”

Fighting the pages in a brisk wind, I was taken back to the days of my childhood and concluded that the day was better made for kite flying. I checked the skies over our neighborhood. No kites and not even a single kid was outdoors. I wanted to strangle the inventors of computer games.

The thought came to launch one of my own. But our home was barren of kites; stiff winds had shredded the last one during a beach vacation.

I bored back into my book. Hemingway was sizing up to be quite the adventurous character. Loved Cuba to the extent that J. Edgar Hoover kept a file on him. Drank heavily. Ran through a number of wives. Loved catching big fish. Hunted German submarines with his fishing boat!

The following afternoon found me looking for an excuse to escape the house. I usually head to the YMCA for a workout when the long line of students begins filing in and out of our home for tutorial services offered by my wife.

On this particular Monday, I felt a little lazy and had an overwhelming urge to make a kite. Winds were still perfect.

I had done this as a kid and stormed through the house gathering the materials — string, paper, wood, glue and tape.

But I was lacking in patience, and after two failed attempts to build the thing, I surrendered to the temptation to go out and buy one.

Two women at the Last Minute Market near my home looked at me like I was nuts. Mine had been a last-minute decision.

“It’s for my grandkids,” I white-lied to answer an odd look from the guy at Food Lion. I ventured farther to the town of Oak Ridge.
“You know it is March,” I snapped to the guy at Lowes.

“We don’t have them in yet,” I was told at CVS. Determined, I headed all the way to Kernersville.

Ah. Farmers Hardware. Any business that serves free popcorn to its customers would surely carry kites. Wrong. But it was refreshing to see the young woman working at the counter gaze dreamily at the sky and exclaim, “You’re right. This is a perfect day to fly a kite. I’d love to be doing that myself.”

I finally found kites at Target, but the selection was mostly limited to cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man. Nor did Hannah Montana match my style. I just wanted one of those simple, diamond-shaped kites, the duller the color the better.

Walmart offered much of the same in larger quantity. I had finally lowered my standards to the brightly colored choice between a macaw and a butterfly when two women and five kids rooted me right out of the kite section. Ten dollars, I rationalized, was too expensive anyway.

Having once again reached the outer limits of my patience, I pointed my truck homeward but made three more stubborn stops.

I guess he was expecting a complaint when I snatched the first employee I saw at Harris Teeter and said, “You look like a manager type.” No kites, pal.

The low point of my search came at Dollar General, where 5 p.m. traffic made getting out of their parking lot nearly impossible. No kites to boot.

Walgreens had never failed me with a prescription, but that day — you guessed it — they were unable to deliver. I limped home in defeat.

Frustrated that I had squandered two hours and as many gallons of gasoline, I grabbed “Hemingway in Cuba” and retreated again to the peace of my deck. Soon thereafter came three disturbing realizations.

The wind had ceased to blow. I was indeed as pitiful as the fascinating man about whom I was reading. And dang, I had forgotten all about Rite Aid.

Tim Pegram writes books, articles and this column from his home in Oak Ridge. Contact him at timpegram@aol.com