Happy 21st Birthday Winta!

The other weekend was an unforgettable kind of day.... I wanted to do something big for Winta's 21st birthday and long story short, we decided to do a hot air balloon ride. Buck's family and my family all pitched in to help pay for it and it all worked out. So early Saturday morning I woke her up and told her to get warm clothes on for her surprise. Once we got there she still had no clue and even after I told her and they started setting up the balloon she seemed confused. I'm not sure she really knew what a hot air balloon really was?! I knew she'd be nervous but I figured she'd end up enjoying it and thinking it was a crazy and memorable. But the fact that she didn't even really know what it was?! Can you imagine? Someone is like “Hey you're going to stand in this tiny BASKET and this thin material balloon is going to float you up HIGH into the sky, oh and the balloon floats with this huge FIRE thing but yeah it's totally normal and safe, let's go!” Like..... yeah. 

So I promised her that it was totally safe and how the guy had a 100% safety record.

The basket was SO SMALL though. The other time I went with Buck, years ago, that basket was four times as big! So the small basket did feel a bit scarier. There were five of us in there- Winta, me, the pilot, and his friend and the friend's older dad (who was also a first timer and nervous, but his son seemed to have gone several times before with this friend, the pilot) and I was kind of thinking like, what am I doing here, too?! You know? But we got in and up we went! Winta was scared for sure but soon she started to relax as he went down lower and up and lower and up again. It was peaceful and it wasn't even too cold with the morning sun on our faces and the frequent fire overhead. Towards the end of the trip she said that she liked it and it was cool.

As we went to land in a high school foot ball field we see the stadium lights getting closer and closer...... I was thinking “Those look too close... but surely he sees them and knows what he's doing..... umm, wait, maybe not, OH MY GOSH THE LIGHTS!” and I yelled out, “THE LIGHTS!” and then-- CRASH! We ran right into them! Instantly the ropes of the balloon got tangled in the lights, there were 12 of them, stacked in two rows. The friend instantly jumped up on the edge of the basket and started trying to get the ropes off the lights (found out later that the pilot and his friend work together as firemen so no wonder he knew how to react quickly in a life threatening situation) and the pilot (I can't remember anyone's names....) was trying to work the fire to make the balloon either go up a little or down. There was not a lot of room for error- if those lights started tearing through the actual balloon we could be toast. I think we were all calculating what our situation and potential outcomes would be.... Winta and I were crouched down in the basket, trying to stay out of the way. The ground crew parked and were trying to help with the rope the guy threw down there. It was pretty tense and crazy. I looked down and realized that if we fell we would most likely die from that height but if we lived we'd have so many shattered bones....

The thing is that I felt so calm though, like I knew we were going to be okay. I attribute that to the spirit! So that was a cool thing. But I did feel worried about Winta and how scared she was and I felt SO BAD that I had taken her on this and I had even promised it would be totally safe! I jinxed it!

Thank God, truly, we eventually got untangled and down safe!

Winta, happy that we didn't die.

We finally made it back to the parking lot, had the toast with everyone with some cider. The pilot felt HORRIBLE and gave us a full refund. 

Celebrating that we are alive.

When Winta and I got back into our car we both busted up laughing so hard we cried. I think it was a mix of the shock wearing off, the trauma, the absurdity of the whole situation.... the irony of telling Winta that we were going to do something “unforgettable” and then truly doing just that..... What else can you do but laugh? As Shakespeare says, “All's well that ends well”.... right...?

So yeah..... I hesitate to post this because I don't want to tarnish this man and his business becasue it truly was a crazy accident- I think he had been looking behind us at something else, so anyway, we're not upset. Life is a risk and we got into that basket knowing there are risks. Those kinds of things rarely happen though- he felt so bad- in all his years he's never had any problems so yeah.... don't all get too scared either to ever go on a hot air balloon.... ;)  

 Aside from near death experiences, we also celebrated with some cake, balloons, and presents, because every birthday needs those things too.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY WINTA!!! 

The hot air balloon poem they recite after every flight:

"May the winds welcome you with softness. May the sun bless you with its warm hands. And sets you gently back into the loving arms of Mother Earth."