The other day I was trying to fly a stunt kite for the first time.  It turned out to be more difficult than I had expected, but I was prepared for this ordinary sort of failure, and bore it with good grace.  I got the lines tangled up, spent 45 minutes untangling them, and then spent a further hour failing to launch.  But that’s not the kind of failure I’m talking about today.

While I was battling a construction of ripstop nylon, carbon spars, and twine, more and more people began to arrive on the scene: the field I was using is also in use for pee-wee football.  Now, personally, I despise the kind of parent that lets their child engage in organized contact sports.  I think that sending your child off every day after school to be indoctrinated by grown men who shout at them is quite strange.

So more and more SUVs are cruising into the parking lot, and quite a lot of these parents and children are standing around watching me fail time and again (I lost track) to launch the kite.

And here’s where I failed: in my mind, I started to think that these people were mocking me for failing.  I heard a few shouts that may or may not have been addressed to me, but in my mind. I made them about me.

I started to imagine all the things I would say or do if anyone were actually to approach me and make some remark, all weird macho fantasies about using my limited martial-arts skills to teach them a lesson.

Well, I finally gave up – they were going to use the field – but I left in a very bad mood.  And I wondered: just what the hell is wrong with me?  I can can take one kind of failure, but to be mocked is somehow worse than actual failing?

How much of the anger and violence in our lives exists solely in our minds?