Float On

As I have been every Tuesday since the first of September, I was in the fellowship meeting room when the balloon started ascending. We were a couple of minutes from the start of our twice-weekly sessions. I was perched on the couch chatting with one of the other fellows, catching up about the last week of classes for the quarter and sharing our plans for winter break.

Before our sessions, I always check my phone—a last moment of connection, as we’re strongly encouraged to be fully present for the next two hours. There was a text waiting for me. A friend asked if we could talk. I quickly replied, explaining that my session was about to start. They insisted it would only take thirty seconds. I give them a call.

On the other end of the line, I heard four words that joyfully floored me. My friend had received life-saving news. The battle they’d been fighting was over.

Once I fully grasped what they were telling me, the tears started, and I thought for a second they might not turn off. To cry is not exactly a shock; I am a crier, a certified boo-hooer, but these tears came from a place I didn’t even know existed inside of me. As my friend shared the details of their news, my mind and heart developed a greater understanding of the moment's gravity; it was as if someone had knocked a ten-pound weight off my shoulders. A weight I didn’t know I was carrying, but once I was made aware, the relief was instant, and the idea of it being there made the tears wail up from that place, a deep penetrative shoulder cry.

If I felt this much release, I couldn’t fathom the wave of relief they must have been riding. My friend, a model of resilience in the face of immense personal adversity, must feel like a balloon, weightless and untethered among the stars.

I’ve been looking back on that wonderful announcement. I’ve caught myself smiling as my mind pictures my friend starting their ascent into the boundless air of healing. There they are, floating high up in the air, free to live the rest of their days untethered to the ground for the first time in too long.

Freedom is such a precarious thing. You can be full of it on one side while the other hand remains bound. Watching my friend’s journey, even from a limited perspective, has clarified this for me. What they’ve taught me, though, is that the hand you choose to focus on will lead you forward. Time and again, they’ve chosen to use their free hand so beautifully that you might miss the binds altogether. Their belief in possibility—stubborn, radiant, and unshakable—was the oxygen that kept their balloon floating even as the weights became heavier.

This moment also reminds me of the collective value of one person. The relief I felt wasn’t just for them; it was for all of us who witness their goodness in the world. In times like these, when it feels like the earth is trembling beneath us, their presence, work, and light feel all the more essential.

As I and others have told them their life, their renewed health is a gift to the world. A reminder that we live not just for ourselves but as a beacon for others. During this season, when we are reminded of the miracle of the birth of a baby born many moons ago, I am glad to know that miracles remain; I know because I am watching a balloon of a human float above me as I type.

Float on.