A Balloon in Maine

Last Thursday, early in the morning, about 3:00 am I literally gasped myself awake. I am not sure what I had been dreaming about but when I startled awake I felt this tremendous urge to remember to tell you something important when you got back from your trip, and then I remembered, that it would never matter if I remembered what it was that I needed to tell you because I would never get a chance to tell you. It was in that moment that I felt that horrible sensation of weight on my chest and sadness in my heart. All of this, from the moment I awoke to when I fell back to sleep, all took place within a few minutes, maybe five tops. I woke up that morning to the sound of my alarm with greatest feeling of emptiness and dread, from which I blamed the episode that jarred me awake in the middle of the night. While I was getting ready that morning, Jared came into the bathroom and asked me what I had been dreaming about. I told him that I couldn't remember what it was and left it at that, feeling the need to protect him from my incessant whining. He gave me a hug goodbye and told me that he heard me crying, quite loudly, in my sleep, and was happy that I didn't remember whatever it was that made me so upset. I hadn't realized that I had been crying.

Right before I left to take Reagan to the bus stop I ran back into the bathroom to grab my necklace, the one with your ring on it, only to find it a tangled mess of confusion and mixed together with the the necklace with the red bird on it. I giggled to myself for reasons that I will leave between you and I. As I stood there, running late, exhausted, and detangling my necklace, I thought to myself that the day was not starting out very well.

Work did not go much smoother than the start of my day. There wasn't one particular incident that I could really blame for the rockiness but more a series of insignificant events that, on any other day would have meant nothing to me, but because I started off the day with my nerves exposed and feeling so raw, felt like mini tsunamis.

I cut my losses short and left work a few minutes early to attend a meeting at the church with our 5K fundraiser committee. We planned to discuss some strategic changes we could make to host a more successful event the following year. I was in no mood to discuss making anything better after the day that I had just experienced. So, taking some inspiration from the guest posts from your parents, I decided to "go on a little adventure" and take the scenic route to the church. As I took the unfamiliar right turn onto Richard Russell Scenic Highway (what an appropriate road name), I was remembering this time when you were much younger, maybe 11 or 12 years old. You got this idea, probably from some TV show, to write a note and your name and phone number, in permanent marker, on a balloon and then release it. You had imagined that it would make it to some far off country, perhaps India or China, and that some unsuspecting child there would find it and call you up to let you know. While I thought it was interesting idea, I am also a realist, and unfortunately a bit of a skeptic at times. So I immediately told you how ludicrous it was with a laugh and told you that I had doubted if it would make it across the street, and that even if it did make it a few miles that it would probably land in a tree and never found. You, being you, laughed at my skepticism and told me that I could believe what I wanted. I don't remember how much time went by, a few weeks, maybe a month, but one evening we received a call from a lady in Maine that had found your balloon in a tree in her yard (I was partially right). She had been so fascinated and tickled when she saw your name and request to call to let you know where the balloon had come to rest. You made sure to gloat and I would like to say that was the last time I ever doubted your bizarre ideas, but that would be a lie.

I am not sure what had made me think of that memory, perhaps it was a mechanism to help self soothe the anxiousness I had felt all day, but it was about that time that I came around one of the hundreds of twists in the route I had chosen and there, coming out of the trees of the Chattahoochee National Forest came what had, at first, appeared to be a dog, but upon closer examination I saw that it was the most beautiful black bear. I literally slammed on my breaks right as I came to be lined up with the beast, I pulled out my camera and was able to get a single picture of it. During the same trip, only moments after my encounter with the bear I stopped at one of the many overlooks and snapped the picture of Mount Yonah that is above.

I have prided myself my whole life on being punctual, if not early, to every engagement and as I stood there looking out over the trees and into scene of mountaintops, I thought how great it felt to not care. For one of the first times in my life, I wasn't rushing from one place to the other or glancing at my watch or welling up with anxiety of being late, I was just standing there. I thought about how you lived your life like this everyday, allowing fate to take you where you needed to go and not allowing yourself to be dictated by a schedule. I thought about the carefree mind that thought of the idea to set a balloon with a name and a phone number off into the air with the faith that some very kind person somewhere eight or so states away would actually take the time to remove the balloon from a tree and then take the time to call long distance to the little girl that let it go. Once again, Chelsea, you have taught me something new.

And do you know, I arrived at my meeting ten minutes early anyway. I remember that I still had the rocks that your nieces painted in the back seat of the car. Armed with a new sense of calm and some extra time on my hands I grabbed the rocks and the camera and went around the back of the church to the Memorial Garden, where we laid your ashes. I laid the rocks, that were lovingly painted by Reagan and Sophie weeks before, next to the bench in the garden so that you could always have a little piece of your home (the rocks came from Dan's property) with you there. I had been sitting on the bench for only a few minutes when I noticed that your name had been added to the large piece of granite that marked the people whose ashes were scattered in the garden. I took a few pictures and reflected on what an amazingly strange day I had.

How a day could start so horribly wrong and end with so many wonderful surprises? It was a day that reminded me of you, with so many logically incorrect thoughts and choices but so many delightful astonishments.

I guess I know what I have to do this weekend ;)