Dead Letter Department # 63

weather report

I wanted to bring balloons to the party last weekend. There’s something festive about them, I’m convinced, and simultaneously goofy, something you’d hand to a five year old, or that they would give to you in full confidence that you will appreciate it just the way they would. The last person to give me one, actually, was my niece, & it’s one of those sharp memories: her running down the trail at the lake with the balloon bobbing along above her, so excited to hand it off to me. It lived in my prayer plant for quite a long time, so that I could remember the day.

The time I’d had balloons in my possession before that was for my friend B’s 30th birthday party, a surprise, an elaborate one, with cocktails & casino games. B’s wife had rented a hall, & sent invitations, organized the out of town friends & relatives, & we were decorating the tables, which were each supposed to have the same number of balloons. The problem arose when we realized the day was so hot that some number of them would always pop in the crowded airspace of the car, or on the way inside. I had been ferrying back and forth to the store any number of times to replenish their numbers, but we kept ending up with an odd number, a single balloon off at one table, no matter how she redistributed it.

Finally, with the timidity of the non-party-planning part of the equation, I dared to ask. “Does it really need to be exactly even? I don’t think anyone will notice.” In fact, I was certain of it. The room was filling up with happy queers in black tie & cocktail dresses, a swirl of activity. No one was going to be counting balloons.
B’s wife shook her head. “You don’t understand,” she said. “His mother is coming. She’ll notice immediately.”

This seemed like a wild, possibly even paranoid exaggeration to me. How would she even begin to notice a single missing balloon in that big room? Still, I went off to collect the next batch, hoping we would finally come out even. We didn’t, of course, and I happened to be stationed near the door when B’s parents arrived, partially because I was one of the only people to not be actively scared of his dad, who was intimidating, but carried himself enough like my own father that I could roll with it. B’s mother barely had her coat off when she turned to look at the hall—hours & hours of work, full of friends & food & tremendous love for B. She pointed to the table in far back of the banquet hall. “That one’s uneven,” she told B’s wife. “You’re missing a balloon.”

If you’re broke, the best you can hope for with a gift is that it will somehow carry the feeling along with it, so I wanted to bring balloons. We left early on Saturday, stopping at my own Haggen, where they inexplicably were completely out of number ones—perhaps we’ve got an enormous batch of just-turned-one-year-olds in the neighborhood? I spun the rack, trying to problem solve. “Could I just get three fives?” I asked C. “That adds up to 15 for their anniversary, but I think it would look weird.” No, we decided, and searched up the next closest floral department, which was, happily, well-stocked with ones, although they were a different color.

We were starting to be short on time, so I hurried through the checkout while my friend waited, and she was getting handed an enormous golden five when I got back, but the guy working behind the counter seemed to be struggling with the number one. “I think it’s defective,” he said, so I picked another one off the rack, and then another one, in a different color, before he finally managed to wrangle the helium into it & we set off to the car.

It was busy down at the boardwalk, so we parked all the way up the hill & started our descent to the party, getting buffeted firmly by helium-filled Mylar in the head and face every time the wind picked up. By the time we got to the water, we both had death grips on the balloons in a desperate attempt to keep hold of them in the powerful gusts, but the weather outfoxed us, ripping the big golden five out of my friend’s hand before we even managed to tie it to the table by the ice cream. It made a pretty picture, sailing away into the blue sky, turning into a glint of gold, and as I tried to tether the blue one, it followed, leaving us holding the strings.

one good thing

The other event this weekend, besides the only briefly ballooned party, was a queer maker’s market at a studio in my neighborhood. I was a little nervous about going, but as soon as we walked in the door I realized it was going to be dope as hell: dozens of artists, mostly young, with tables of earrings & stickers & beautiful prints & every kind of pronoun pin a person could need. I spent more than I should have on stickers for my laptop, including the one above, & a book by a local sci-fi writer I’d never met before. I talked to more people than I usually do in a month, & it was good to remember that I still know how to do that: make small talk, learn something about a stranger.

Thank you, once again, for being here. If you like the newsletter, please share it with a friend or consider subscribing to the secret edition, where I’m writing my way through transition. Write to me anytime at departmentofdeadletters@gmail.com.

I hope to see you here at the Dead Letter Department again soon, & in the meantime, may all your parties have exactly the right number of balloons.