Balloons to Heaven

Yesterday’s fundraiser went better than expected given the fact that we woke to a most nasty wind. We were worried that the weather would keep people away from the fifth and sixth grade boys’ football game where we intended to hold a hamburger fry and bake sale but the people in our community are a hardier lot than I would have imagined and they showed up en masse.

Following the game, the principal of the elementary school gave a fabulously warm speech about Brandon and his teammates then presented his mother with his jersey and a plaque explaining that the jersey was being officially retired from the school program.

The committee who planned the fundraiser had asked The Girl if she would then present Brandon’s mom with a scrapbook that the kids have been working on in their grief class and The Girl was honored to do so. She got through it a lot better than I thought she would, too.

After the presentations, we launched over a hundred balloons and, for just that brief amount of time, the wind settled down.

The parents, grandparents, teachers and friends of the football boys made for a decent lunch crowd and, as luck would have it, two high school teams from communities on opposite ends of our side of the state met on our field for their league game. This brought even more parents, etc. and we grilled burgers for three hours, making enough money to fund this year’s scholarship in Brandon’s name.

I’m so proud to be part of this community.

I’m proud of my daughter.

I’m proud of my husband who stood in winds up to thirty-miles per hour, cooking hamburgers with a smile on his face (he has a lot less hair on his arms, from being singed by the flames but, he never much cared for hairy arms, anyway).

It was a good day.