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Copyright 2009-2010 by
Mary Brotherton
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Inside my Brain


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Sunday, October 18, 2009


Rather than sleeping in, on this Saturday, I drove to the Viera Regional Park for Get Active! Brevard. Soon, Chris and Katie joined me. Chris brought a tent; Katie and I each brought a box of giveaways.

We had fun trying to erect a tent against the wind, and had just completed it when Jill and her son arrived. Unfortunately a strong gust brought it down on my head. No injuries, but we decided it would be better to have no tent than one that might fall again at any moment.

Chris took his tent and left. Jill was still bringing items from her car and Katie set to the task of decorating our table while Jill and I hung our new Viera Voice banner across the front. Once Jill brought out the balloon tanks, traffic at our table picked up rapidly.

I almost convinced a young man that my rope loop was a soft hula hoop until he saw the bean bags. None of the children seemed impressed or interested in the rope rings we’d made to accept the beanbag toss. They wanted balloons and whatever else we had to give away. Some even thought the beanbags were tschotskes. We had a few who requested we not attach our water bottles to the end of the balloon string and others requested no string at all. One girl even requested that we not tie it for her. Gee. Do you think she planned to inhale the helium?

When the 100 balloons were gone, Jill considered going to buy more, but agreed to just give out the water bottles, hand sanitizer bottles, small games and other things we had on hand. Late arrivals didn’t even know we’d had balloons earlier, so they didn’t care.

When the traffic died down and we no longer had a line at our table, the 4-year-old grew restless. Jill handled most of the queries and handouts while I played with her son. He and I invented games on the spot and I videotaped him running around dragging ropes. He loved that and I didn’t mind the chance to sit. Before long, though, he and I were playing a sort of Tug of War. The next thing I knew, other small children were lining up for a chance to see if they could defeat me. We even had one mother square off against her pre-teen daughter.

The event ended at 2 p.m. By the time I returned home, I was exhausted. All I wanted after my shower was to snuggle under my Telletubbies blanket. I didn’t mind being all alone for a while.