My beautiful, my beautiful balloon!

Today Chad was walking with me from the library to the music building where I had class. We had to go to the library to print the inserts for the sets of funeral CDs we made for the family. This girl walking towards us says "Do you guys want a balloon?" Now, let us pause for a second.

Who wouldn't want a balloon?! I thought it was a trick. ... okay, what are you selling, cuz I want the balloon but not whatever else you're trying to rope me into. I look her over - she's got no clipboard, just a backpack and a sky blue balloon bobbing over her shoulder as if to say "pick me! pick me!"

"Heck yes!" I say (mocking Napoleon Dynamite, not seriously.) She explains "I'm going to the library and I can't take it with me." Let us pause again here.

Now, is there some kind of rule that you can't bring balloons into the library? Was that a problem at some point? Such a problem that they had to make a rule? How does she even know about this rule, if such a rule exists? Did she have a balloon one day and the library security (who take their jobs a little too seriously) says "I'm sorry, we don't allow balloons" and made her tie it to the bike rack outside to pick it up on her way out? I wonder.

So she hands me the balloon, we say thanks - she continues on her way to the library and I on mine to class. I took my balloon to class with me and let it sit in the corner while we had clarinet sectional. I packed up my clarinet when that was over and took it to my locker with my faithful companion bobbing behind me. As I approached my locker I had the strangest flashback of being in high school and it being my birthday.

I had to go home to get something I had forgotten for my photography class later that night. I wrapped the ribbon of my balloon around my fingers a bunch of times to be sure not to lose it to the cold February Rexburg sky. I trotted to the crosswalk, my balloon blowing in the wind behind me. As the cars came up, I imagined that I was in Mario Kart and I was playing versus and I only had one balloon left and the cars would try to pop my poor solitary balloon. Luckily, I was not in Mario Kart. I got across the street safely, and made the 2 blocks home. I passed a girl who couldn't help but smile as she passed me. She was trying to hold it in, but I saw a smile creep out at the last second.

And I realized as I walked down the sidewalk, that trailing a balloon behind you makes you feel like a little kid again. There's a little bounce in your step, the sun shines just a little bit brighter, and you feel pretty happy. There's nothing like the feeling of having a balloon follow you wherever you go. Always in your face, like a puppy wanting to be held and then insisting on licking your face.

So now my sky blue balloon floats, tied to the kitchen chair, keeping watch over our apartment.

(It does have a flyer taped to its ribbon telling me to volunteer at the hospital, so I wasn't wrong in assuming it was a gimmick of some kind, but nonetheless.)