Growing up, I did alot of traveling. My brothers competed in sport kite flying. It's an obscure little sport wherein you fly a kite, attached to two strings. Depending on how you manipulate the strings you can make shapes and do certain tricks, coordinated to music. Weird, I know, but it was a fun way to grow up. I've been alot of places and collected alot of stories, but my favorite by far is my National Security story.

I'm 11 years old. My older brother qualified for the Nationals, which were held in New Jersey that year. We're on the East Coast, so where does my war history obsessed dad decide to go? DC, of course. And what happens to be my father's dream? Flying one of our kites in the feild around the Washington monument.

So we go, we see the sights, we fly the kite, we get the photo, my dad's giddy, the rest of us are exhausted... but we have one sight left to see. The White House.

Now, this is what the kite bag is shaped like. It's yea around, and yea long. We weren't thinking about this at the time, but I bet you can imagine an assortment of things you could fit into a bag like that. And in DC, very few people would think, "Oh! They must fly kites!"

But like I said, we weren't thinking about that at the time. So we're crossing the street, just gonna stay for a minute or two before driving back to New Jersey, and I see, beyond the fence surround the grounds of the White House, literally bursting out of the shrubs, comes a very tall, very imposing man, walking right towards us. He's dressed all in black from head to toe, his hand inside a satchel at his side. I can't take my eyes off him. He's walking right toward me. Little 11 year old me is feeling a little panicky I'd seen enough movies to know what was in that bag--

To my left I hear a friendly voice, "Hello! Where are you folks from?" I hear my dad engaging in conversation with someone, but I'm hardly paying attention, because as we turn to walk down the street toward whoever my dad was talking, the man in black turned and was walking the fence along with us, staring down the little 11 year old who was gaping up at him.

To the side I hear the conversation taking place, "Where you from?" "What brings you here?" "How long are you here for?" "What did you see today?" And I hear my family answering jovially, having a nice chat with whoever they are--

I hear one of my brothers note to my mother that he was cold. Aha! An escape from the terrifying man with the sachel and the black! I run to my mother, claiming that I, too, was cold. My dad swings our highly questionable bag from his shoulder, where we had stuffed our coats earlier in the day, which is when I notice that the awfully friendly person my folks had been chatting with was a cop. As my dad dropped to his knee to get in the bag, She, the cop, says, "So what do you have in the bag?" I hear rustling behind me and I glance back to the Satchel Man who was now pacing back and forth, glowering like I have never seen a human being glower.

My dad says, "Oh, kites. Would you like to see one?" "Yes," says the cop, "I would like to see them ALL." So clutching my jacket, trying not to look at the Satchel Man behind me and be utterly unable, my dad pulled out all the kites and opened them up, telling her aaaaaaaall about them, and after emptying out the bag entirely and refilling it, the cop wished my brother good luck at the competition the following day and we wandered off.

Satchel Man followed us until the fence made it impossible for him to follow any further, and I turned in time to watch his crash back into the shrubbery, just as my dad leaned over to my mother to whisper, "Do you think it was the BAG?!"

~*~*~

this is what i've decided to talk about in my Speech class tomorrow.