Guest column: A story came my way

Andy Asmussen/for The Herald

I haven’t felt much like writing lately. Seems I have a case of “writer’s block,” whatever that really is.

I used to just think of it as an “all” excuse for not doing whatever the writer was supposed to be doing. Surely nobody could ever really honestly claim they had nothing to write about. I mean, after all, every day is filled with things to write about.

Take yesterday, for example. I turned on the noon news, and was immediately caught up in a “breaking news event” and whisked off to Colorado for a live aerial shot of a helium-filled balloon racing across the skies. A 6-year-old boy was reportedly stowed away on board. As aloft winds propelled the balloon at an estimated altitude of 7,000 feet, it appeared to be collapsing on itself as the once-trapped helium escaped.

Thoughts were immediately racing through my cavernous bonnet as I, hypnotically affixed to the television screen, lowered my self into my well-worn and comfortable EZ chair. “Now how do you suppose the kid got into this predicament?’” I pondered, a silent, mischievous smile lurking in the recesses of my mind.

“Fly Away...Fly Away...”

Haven’t we all, at one time or another, just wished we could “fly away?” Well, by God, this kid had done just that! And here he was, apparently blasting across the Colorado skies, inside a silver, UFO-like, helium-filled balloon, with nary a care in the world.

Swiftly across the camera screen the silver, mushroom-shaped object flew. The object floating upright, with an apparent unseen compartment, stowing a 6-year-old boy at its stem-like center point. Narrators’ conjecture filling the sound bites, I was almost giddy with childhood wonder as I dreamed of all the stories this young boy would have to tell once he landed... “And then there was the day, I took a balloon ride across the Colorado skies...” I smiled at the whimsical thought.

“Never mind the stories,” I bantered back at my nonsensical thoughts, “the kid must be freezing!” I was starting to come back to the story line that everyone else had been listening to as ideas bounced back and forth across the airwaves. How do we get the balloon down (and safely?) had been the number one question on everyone’s mind. But now apparently the question had shifted when the balloon came down.

As a larger, upper portion of the balloon had deflated, clearly it was descending. This, luckily, also led to an unbalance within the spherical upper chamber causing a spiral change in the flight path. So now, rather than a continuing chase across the Colorado fields, the balloon was staying in a somewhat confined flight area and descending easily. The kid couldn’t have been a better pilot, but evidently someone a bit higher up was guiding this ship.

Well, as all stories do, this one came to an end. Nobody was on board after all. Some little ones, and some parents too, had some explainin’ to do.