July 2010
A balloon, what on earth can I write about a balloon. I know nothing. The only thing that comes to mind is the poem:
Who knows if the moon’s a balloon
Coming out of a keen city
In the sky, filled with pretty people
This of course is nonsense, everyone knows the moon’s made of cheese.
I once saw a wonderful French film called The Red Balloon, about a small boy running with a big balloon through the streets of Paris, down narrow Alleyways where the balloon bumped against the walls in an alarming way, eventually coming to the River, where the boy sets the balloon free and we watch it float gently across the Seine, over Notre Dame and off into the misty Paris landscape.
I think my favourite literary balloon story is the one when Winnie the Pooh sees a bees nest in a tall tree. Where there are bees there is honey, so he works out a cunning plan to disguise himself and float up to the top of the tree to collect some honey. Should he use Christopher Robin’s blue balloon and look like a cloud, or the green one and look like a tree?
He settled for the blue one, he’d try to look like a small black cloud. He floated gracefully to the top of the tree. The bees became suspicious. Pooh decided they were the wrong kind of bees and he’d better come down. But how?
Christopher Robin came to the rescue and deciding it was better to spoil the balloon than spoil the bear, shot the balloon and Pooh came to earth with a bump. He found his arms were so stiff from holding the balloon that they stayed up straight for over a week.
Then there was the time when Piglet was carrying a big red balloon, a birthday present for Eeyore. Sadly he put his foot down a rabbit hole and fell flat on his face. BANG!! After realising the world had not exploded, and he was not on the moon he got up and looked for the balloon. All he could find was a damp piece of rag. Hoping that Eeyore didn’t like balloons much he trotted on. Eeyore was pleased to hear he had been given a present, one of those big coloured things you blow up, gaity, song and dance. But slightly disappointed when he received the damp burst balloon. Then Pooh arrived with the pot of honey, well the pot, finding it was time for a little something he had accidently eaten all the honey. Eeyore, philosophical as usual made the best of it and became quite excited when he discovered the balloon would go into the useful pot. The two friends left him happily putting the balloon in and taking it out again.
As I said, what can I say about a balloon?