The Boy Who Lived on a Balloon (A Parable of Loss)

The Boy Who Lived on a Balloon
(A parable of loss)
By: Susan Chapman

There once was a boy who lived on a balloon. He had always been there. No one knows how.

He soared every day through the clouds and felt the wind and sun on his face.

He loved his balloon and he loved how it made him feel. He loved how he could see the valley below. He knew no other life than that of living on a balloon.

One day his balloon popped and disappeared in the wind. He was lucky and was unhurt but was left on the ground stunned. He looked up to the sky and clouds and missed his balloon and the only life that he had known. He began to cry. He cried hard, then harder. He missed his balloon, he missed how it made him feel safe, he didn’t like the ground. His heart was broken.

As he cried an ant crawled by him. “Why are you crying?” the ant asked. The little boy told the ant about his balloon, the clouds and the sky. The ant was amazed. “I do not know what it is like to fly in the clouds” the ant said. “That would be incredible. I only know what it is like to crawl on the earth below but that is incredible too.”

“How could the ground be incredible?” asked the boy.

The ant explained that he too had adventures and began to recount them to the boy. He told him that he would look for crystals in the stones below and often inspected the wonders of the ground and the creatures he found there. The ant loved the dirt beneath his feet. He loved to find treasures and take them back to his family.

The ant left and the boy still missed his balloon. He cried all night and when the sun came out in the morning it dried his tears. He realized he could still feel the sun on his face even though he was not on his balloon. He looked down on the ground and saw crystals shining through the rocks below. He could see how the ant found the rocks interesting.

Soon the boy came to love the feel of dirt under his feet and the wind on his face as he ran. He still missed his balloon and the days that he spent in the clouds but he began to love the ground as well. He loved the feel of water on his toes and how it felt to jump and roll and other things he would not have experienced on his balloon.

One night he had a dream of his balloon and he asked his balloon why it left him so soon.
 “The only thing sure in life is change” said the balloon
“But I wasn’t ready for it.” said the boy
“We are never ready for change” said the balloon “And those who are, are far past the need for it.”
“I just want one more day” said the boy
“Your memories are better than one more day.” said the balloon “One more day will never be enough with something you love. A day ends and it is still just memories. Memories last forever.”
“But my heart is broken” said the boy
“Yes” said the balloon “but it is also enlarged. An unbroken heart is hard to enlarge. You not only love the sky now but you also love the land. Your love has expanded. You have grown little one, far beyond the child who once flew with me through the clouds.

With that the boy awoke. He felt the sun on his face. He ran and felt the wind on his face too. He missed his balloon. The hurt would never go away but he began to be grateful to be blessed to have experienced the wonders of both the sky and the ground. He realized that his heart still felt broken sometimes but more than broken now it also felt enlarged with love not only for the sky but also for the ground.

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An extra note about this story

One night I had a dream about my brother.

In reality he had died a few years ago but in my dream I had forgotten that. We were talking and laughing like we used to. When I woke up I remembered he was gone. My heart again ached but I felt compelled to write this story and the words flowed freely as I wrote it. I feel it was somehow a gift from him. We are never meant to "move on" but we can however learn to live again in a different way with a new perspective added to the old. There are many types of loss in our lives, loss of loved ones. loss of the way things used to be. We never will understand the depth of each others loss if we tried to compare but I hope it helps someone who is dealing with whatever type of loss they have. To you my friend I am sorry for your loss. May you find bits of peace and tender mercies at this time.