kicks
The lights were dim at the fanciest restaurant in the once burgeoning, but recently foreclosing, beach development in North Carolina.
My family walked into the steakhouse in our standard fashion: comfortably under-dressed. Pat wore a purple Milwaukee Bucks jersey with nice Clarks flip-flops. John zipped on the bottom quarter of his convertible hiking pants and Mike looked like he usually does. My mom layered a vest over her beach muu muu and Dad tucked in his polo shirt. We sent the hostess off to assemble a table for six.
I spotted the basket of crayons, but had initially mistaken it for a pile of the mints that I usually like to sample upon entering a restaurant and like to check on while looking for the restroom and stock up on before leaving. Double-checking that the table clothes were also sheets of paper, I grabbed eight Crayolas and followed the team to our seats.
Dad traced his utensils and made plate-sized Olympic rings. Oblong faces emerged between my red-haired brothers. I suspected that Mike was reviewing his old go-to superhero characters. John doodled action comic words in exploding cloud bubbles like “POW” and “BAMMY.” I filled in my happy beach day scene with crabs boogying by a boom box. I was sketching a giant foot, perpetually posed by the salt and pepper, ready to squash the idyllic scene. John told me to give the foot a flip-flop as protection against the spiky umbrella so I reached for the red and saw that he had a cool dancing stick figure cozying up to his iced tea.
“Is he dancing with my crabs?” I asked.
“No he’s doing a flying side kick!” He answered.
Years ago, John went through a flying side kick phase. I remember watching him, donned in a loin cloth—probably a large white tee doubled around his legs—as he leaped off the ledge of the driveway over and over and over. If the sun was just about to set over the tree-lined street, the concrete became a great canvass for shadows. He could watch his cartoon self zoom through space. He studied his silhouette and over time he developed graceful form with one leg outstretched, paralleling the ground, his foot flexed, arms tucked in and gaze fixed on some glimmering suggestion of a target.
John grew out of the loincloth and explored other sports that incorporated leaps and landings like skateboarding and surfing and we all forgot about the karate move.
About a week ago, I flew to Portland to pick Pat up from college. We drove past the falls of the Columbia River Gorge, through the surprising desert of Eastern Washington and lost all radio and cell phone reception as we entered the Rockies. The sun set behind us, and I knew night was falling at eighty miles per hour as we tore eastward.
A dozen miles outside of Missoula, Montana, we pulled into a private campground on the Rock Creek. We ordered burgers and drank from Mason jars and felt quite at home. Pat pitched the tent in a sort of grassy floodplain next to the stream. Finally we settled into a not-so-comfortable night’s rest with our heads pointing down the slope.
Surprisingly, we both awoke sufficiently enthusiastic. Pine-covered summits walled us in and ducks practiced their splash-landings as we packed up the tent.
I felt like somewhere and someone and nowhere and no one as we looked and breathed and stood. Overcome by the earthly magnitudes, Patrick dashed atop the picnic table and leapt into a perfect flying side kick as if to break through our ether and remain in Montana forever.
Pat made me do my move about eight times, and by then, this is the best I could do:
