Last night we attended a “Thank You Reception” to officially mark our friend Kay Buesing’s retirement as founding director of the World Kite Museum and Hall of Fame.  It was held (of course!) at the museum that Kay and her late husband Jim got started years ago – on a kite string, so to speak.  Now, twenty-three years later, the “only American museum devoted exclusively to kites” is a mecca for kite enthusiasts world-wide, and its million dollar building and property are fully paid for.  And Kay did it!

She is the first to say, however, that she didn’t do it alone; she had lots of help along the way.  Therein, of course, lies the magic of Kay.  As speaker after speaker testified last night, Kay has the knack of soliciting help and donations and good will.  She seems to do it effortlessly and with no fanfare at all.  To have a conversation about kites with Kay can be equated to making a commitment – to help with an event, to house a visiting kite expert, to arrange for publicity.  And you find yourself doing so willingly, I might add.  Even enthusiastically.

Speaking from personal experience, even if kites aren’t “your thing,” Kay’s quiet enthusiasm and her deep knowledge of ‘all things kite’ simply suck you in.  Suddenly, there you are in the midst of a roomful of kids learning how to make their first-ever kite.   Or maybe you are meeting a delegation of origami experts at Chico’s the night before an Asian kite festival, helping to get them fed and settled in for the weekend.

I’ve known Kay since the BK (Before Kites) days.  We were both hired by the Ocean Beach School District in the late seventies, she as a high school English teacher, me as an elementary teacher at Long Beach School.  On a professional level, our paths crossed only occasionally, but we also belonged to the same Picnic Group – eight or ten of us who got together spasmodically and on the spur of the moment to have a picnic, indoors or out.  It didn’t matter.  Then, too, Kay and I were founding members of the Peninsula Players in 1980 during their first incarnation.  And somewhere in those early years, kites made their appearance.

As Kay tells it, she was looking for a Christmas present for Jim – a toy of some kind which was a tradition with them.  She found a Skyro-gyro at Dennis Company and on Christmas Day they spent all day on the beach.  Jim would get the kite launched, it would fall, Kay would run up the beach and retrieve it.  Over and over and over.  And that was the beginning, Kay says, with Jim’s love affair with kites.  She never says a word about her own love affair but her eyes sparkle and there is no need to talk about it.

Like so many friendships here at the beach, ours has been casual and yet encompassing.  We know one another’s children; we’ve laughed and gossiped, worried and grieved, partied and relaxed together.  I’ve watched her love affair with kites since the beginning – since the years that she made us believe that it was Jim who was all about kites and she was just the dutiful wife behind the scenes.

Of course, we’ve known differently for a long, long time.  And last night all the important people said so, too.  Kay was named Director Emeritus of the World Kite Museum and Wall of Fame and two plaques were unveiled in her honor.  It was an impressive ceremony for an outstanding woman.  I’m glad we went.  Mostly, I’m glad we know Kay.