The Circus Balloon Man (A Prelude)
1
The Great Depression left many with little to be happy about. Russian immigrant Josef Politovski was certainly feeling that, especially now that winter was looming. His chances for actual survival were slim, he thought. In fact, thinking was what reduced the pain he felt from his hunger. There he sat every day, in his own spot nearing the Waldorf-Astoria, focusing on other things to kill time before Ivan the waiter would walk out and share any leftovers with him.
One particular day Josef smiled at the thought that Salisbury steak did not sit well with the hotel's remaining guests. Ivan came out that afternoon with proof of his idea, along with a flier that made him smile even more: "World Famous Circus coming to New York!"
"Vanya", Josef said, holding the filer up, "does this look like an opportunity?"
Exhausted, and with his mouth half full, Ivan muttered, "You should answer your own question."
Josef stared at Ivan upon hearing his reply. Ivan then nearly choked as the man in front of him rose up off his seat, "Da! You'll need some peanuts with that meat!"
So Josef decided to step up and be of some use by looking for a job in a travelling circus.
2
The wind was merciful the next day. Josef Politovski was outside by the entrance of the Big Top, standing outside in the snow. Yet he was smiling; Josef had landed a small job helping out in pumping and selling circus balloons. To make things livelier for both himself and the children, he would design the balloons, making each one unique with a light ink design.
There he stood, with his face poorly painted, shouting in an attempt to sell his wares. Children would pass by and look at his balloons. Some would give a sneer and keep walking. Still some would try in vain to get one as their parents pulled them away. But Josef would stay there, standing and smiling since he slowly got to learn that at least one child would pass by and buy a balloon.
The circus eventually stopped their show in New York and planned to move. Yet no matter where the elephants, clowns, monkeys, and wrestling midgets(?) went Josef kept on just standing outside the tent of the main event, contributing balloons to keep people's minds off of the poverty the country felt. As long as he sold a balloon, just ONE balloon, he would feel fulfilled.
So Josef kept his mind straight and his stomach barely full by selling circus balloons.
3
As time passed by, America's economic woes also started to wane. Cities started to flourish again; the streets were slowly beginning to fill with workers scurrying about. Slowly did people lose the need to consult with the local circus to get them through the day.
Less people walked into the Big Top now, and Josef wanted to be part of the cause. He started to look for greater opportunities. Perhaps Ivan would need some help in the Waldorf, he thought.
His thinking paid off. Josef left the circus and joined Ivan. They were now part of a workforce serving lobster cocktails and creme brulee to a burgeoning list of guests. He made more money now, and there were some extra rolls of bread for him to take home too.
But it was nothing like the happiness that the simple job of balloon vending brought him. Josef used to tend to smiling, excited children who were simply fascinated by the levitating colored object; now he tends to fat, obnoxious guests who complain that their salad fork wasn't chilled. He was getting what he needed at the price of his happiness. Ivan saw he was depressed, but stopped feeling sorry when he said he just missed selling balloons. He dismissed this sadness that Josef had as a sort of delusion.
So Josef was making more money, yet feeling less happy by getting a real job.
4
Months passed, and Ivan married, while Josef was saving up for a small restaurant of his own. During these times it was not very uncommon for Ivan and Josef to have the same lunch break schedule during work. But one particular meal they had together was providential.
In what seemed to be a timely twist of fate Josef nearly choked as the man in front of him showed him a familiar flier, with a familiar message: "World Famous Circus returns to New York!" Ivan then just gave Josef a smile as if he knew what his friend was about to do.
And he was right. After work Josef ran to the familiar ringmaster's tent and was immediately greeted with welcoming hugs from the ringmaster and the wrestling midgets. Both the former and Josef laughed until tears flowed as one told the other stories of what happened after they last met with the assistance of some gin. Josef mentioned his job in the Waldorf, and the ringmaster kept going on about where the circus has been going. In the long run both men were happy that things were going well.
Then Josef could not resist asking any further. He volunteered his services to the ringmaster, specifically to sell balloons in that familiar spot outside the Big Top, just like the good old days, for the duration of the circus' stay in New York. The ringmaster was more than happy to oblige, and after a moment there Josef stood outside the tent, with a bunch of balloons.
Only there was one problem. There were a lot of designs on Josef's mind in the restaurant while he worked, but now that he had the chance to finally paint them on he had forgotten what he had wanted.
Josef tried to remember and even attempted to paint some designs after his shift over at the Waldorf, but somehow the impact of the designs he drew did not nearly match the potence of those he thought up when he thought he would not be doing that job anymore.
So Josef found a way back to his passion, but did not feel as happy as he used to be.
4.5?
Josef ended up to be more frustrated than before. He felt as if the job he took serving dishes required more concentration and made him forget what made him happy against his will.
The designs and the balloons he made now were nothing compared to those he made in the past, and what hurts is that he knew it. Several times he came up with some impressive balloons but was now insulted because it took longer than usual.
Then he thought of a way, not necessarily to end this fiasco, but to equalize it. Josef was now determined to create a balloon big enough and beautiful enough as a sort of reward to himself to make up for all the times he could have been happy but worked as a waiter instead.
Josef strengthened his will to create a masterpiece as a symbol of his retaliation to necessity.
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(Commercial)
Right now I feel a pain right above my eyes that is not making me think really straight. But as of the moment I feel like I should be typing something down.
See, ideas are like balloons. You get them, you fill them up with air, and at the exact moment you release it for it to serve its own purpose. If you release them earlier than you should you will be left with a soft, limp, ultimately unfinished idea that you'll probably forget about. On the other hand if you pump them with too much air they burst, and you're left with an empty, useless, plastic shell.
This year, my priorities have left me with a huge amount of limp balloons, and quite a few burst ones. Some of them flew, but I'm thinking they were weighed down by bird crap. Or they were probably struck down by lightning. Or some jackass took a sling and shot them down.
I felt that the events of this year were those that deserved a record of my actual opinion or emotion during the time.
However, as I probably already mentioned, the number and speed of these events and the proximity between each event was what left me with either leaving balloons half inflated or bursting balloons.
Usually I would enjoy the irony of events. But I found this particular idea pissed me off a lot. If I may rephrase the past two segments
I was too busy to blog.
Yup. And I hate it. This year revealed a lot to me about a lot of things, and all I remember is that which sticks out the most. Although some may see this as fortunate since it simplifies things, I find it insulting for me to go through an assload of events learning only from a handful of them.
However, most events may come up with a collective lesson. I'm taking the time to type down what I remember for this turbulent year.
Some years ago, right after I read the Purpose Driven Life, I wrote down bad memories, and in an attempt to finally bury them I tried to look for how I benefitted from each and every one of these events. That's pretty much what I want to try doing here. I'm warning you as early as now that even I may find this too melodramatic, but the need to redeem myself is equally necessary.
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The Circus Balloon Vendor (Continued)
But first, Josef Politovski decided to rest.
Around 12 hours, 4 slices of bacon, 1 egg over easy, 1 croissant, a bowl of Cocoa Puffs and 2 cups of tea later he clasped his hands together and cracked his knuckles and began.
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The Year of our Lord Two Thousand and Five. As I recall my emotions started off in a waning form of lamenting and healing from a pretentious heart broken. I guess being human is reacting to the immediate pain without enduring to recognize the more valuable lesson. And just as I thought the amount of time it took to recover was too long albeit necessary, a volley of events requiring the same emotional composure was thrown at me faster than I could catch, leaving me stepping out and in alternately at a very fast rate in the dodgeball game of life.
You can hear all sorts of stories and watch all kinds of movies that would slowly present you with a clear depiction of how life is (presented currently as a game of dodgeball. Just reminding you) but a factor called circumstance bends the rules quite often to get you a hit or make your life very miserable.
For instance, life can throw you a pillow and a lead cannonball a split second later. While you get up life can smack you in the head with a hollow block moving at 90 mph. Rarely does life toss a marshmallow at you.
I must admit to the elder and more seasoned of you that I am new to this game and I need to learn a bit about it. And in the process of learning I may be overreacting in my analysis of what was tossed, thrown, or hurled at me this year. Let me tell you off the bat that I am aware that they could be bad or good, but I know that they are firsts. That's what this year was. 2005 was the Year of Firsts.
Here's a small list.
First job interview. First job. First Girlfriend. First time to know what a router is. First commendation. First promotion. First breakup. First dinner with parents on me. First salary. First bill paid. First time to say "I'd love you if you were 350 pounds!" First time in IHOP. First time in a strip bar. First time to pay for a round of beers without regret. First retainers. First time on a Greyhound bus. First time to hold a Mosin-Nagant. First time I lost 10 pounds in 6 months. First time I gained 10 pounds in a month.
And many, many more events that aroused my curiosity. Yes, aroused.
And I hope I do not call 2006 as a sequel to 2005 in that regard. I confess that this year would have been a lot less on my nerves if I really learned to chill out. An agent who I believed overdosed on speed was what it took for me to realize this. On the other hand I also believed I cannot refuse the priorities set by my principles regardless of how tense my surroundings were.
I thought that this would be a very long article, but upon my pondering on what to type next after that previous paragraph it dawned on me that I still have a problem of thinking too much. Last year I thought it was a good thing, considering how we needed it to weed out any flaws in our thesis. This year it showed its ugly face. It compromised and eventually botched the first relationship that I had. It led to many unnecessary conflicts and delays both in and out of work. Most significantly it left me with countless hours of gut wrenching worry, usually resulting to my indirectly self-induced relief.
For some time I thought that a degree of control over this predicament that I had was all I needed to do. This is what I banked on and tried doing. It has been a year, and sadly I have learned that life does not necessarily give you credit and consideration to what you do or do not prioritize. I have failed my own directive simply because I believed that this beast I had can be tamed. Unfortunately I suffered more from its reverberations.
But what the hell is a man to do but worry? You can worry about a person's well-being and call it thoughtfulness. You can worry about that poor guy in your alley and call it charity. Hell, you can worry about how big your dick is and call it self-improvement.
Hakuna Matata sure sounds like a cute theme but I refuse to lower my expectations. Neither do I believe that a dependence on happenstance is all it takes to get by.
You can leave your worries with friends and family, but they can only go so far. Not that I'm calling them unreliable or incompetent, but it's just that I'm thinking they also have a set of their own worries to think about.
It took this year for me to conclude that depending on yourself won't do you much good either. If I really was any good I would have been blogging on a more regular basis regardless of what was going on at work.
You probably know where I'm going with this one. No? Let's just say this is where reason fails and bows down to faith. And as for me and my household, as the verse goes, we shall serve the Lord. This is simply because my worries, in any definition they may have had this year, have been lifted in ways either apparent or to my benefit in the future if otherwise. I must admit that most of the time I doubted and even questioned my anxiety or the difficulty of situations that I have been through, but the Lord, my Creator, kept on going on, helping me out the best way He could - the ONLY way.
There could be a greater reasoning out there that can topple my opinion on absolute servitude to an all-powerful entity. In fact, there could also be a more succinct reasoning that can explain the point I want to deliver. But let me delve on that another time.
For now, I raise my near-empty cup of tea as a toast for all the good events, and for all the other events where I learned.
I raise my near-empty cup of tea for my friends, more significantly my family that I have been forced to spend less time with.
I raise my nearer-to-empty cup of tea for the friends I met this year.
I raise my nearer-to-empty cup of tea to that personification of all the hatred, worry, fear, regret, and otherwise negative feelings I felt this year. You have been a constant thorn the this world, yet although I will initially feeled the shock and awe of each event that you initiate I will not yield because
I raise my empty mug to the Lord, whose eternal superiority over this force has already been decided about 2000 years ago with the death of one called Jesus, who is the Lord's Son.
For 2005. Cheers.