This balance ball set belonged to my grandfather. I remember playing with it a lot sitting at his dining room table in Panama City.
I got it when my grandmother died in 2003. Now it lives in my study, and Aaron likes it. One morning last week he asked if he could play with it, and I absently agreed, and by the time it occurred to me that he should be receiving close supervision, he had tangled all five balls into a huge mess and merrily sauntered off to something else. My fault all the way.
You just really wouldn’t believe how knotted and twisted this thing can get. The spatial perception required to trace the strings, figure out what’s knotted and what’s merely twisted, etc., is substantial. I wrestled with it for about five minutes that morning and left it for another time.
Another time wound up being tonight. I’ve have snapped a “before” shot, but as badly as it was tangled, I really thought there was about a 75% chance I’d end up ripping all of the fucking balls off, throwing them at (maybe through; they’re heavy) the goddam wall, and smashing the frame into splinters with my bare hands.
(Ten years ago, the chance of that happening would have been about 97%.)
See, this thing is at least 30 years old. The strings are brittle enough to leave a slight smell on your fingers, okay? To say that they are not particularly tolerant of a bunch of jerking and tugging around is an understatement.
Start to finish tonight: 35 minutes. My grandfather’s balance balls have lived to see another day, their sparse elegance on my shelf a shining testimony to the inherent power of patience and restraint.
Dear readers, trust me: this is one damned impressive photograph.
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Bo, I was obsessed with my grandfather’s balance balls when I was a kid! I would with them for hours– my first introduction to Newton’s 3rd law of motion. I wasn’t until an adult got tired of the clack-clack-clack and put them away that I moved on to something else. I can easily see how Aaron tangled them up. I was always trying to see how high I could get them to go. Now both grandparents are gone and I have no idea what happened to the balance balls. I wish I had them. Glad you could save your grandfather’s set. 🙂
I can not only feel the weight of those balls in my hands (otherwise occupied with typing at the moment), but my memory serves up the smell of the metal as well ; my uncle had a set and I recall jostling with my twin sister for position right in front of the set on his highly laquered desk. He stood over 8 or so year-old us to make sure we didn’t rip off the balls and brain each other with them, or something.
Those things are wonderful and I can totally understand the reverence with which you hold your grandfather’s.
No disrespect inteneded, but this post is killing the Michael Scott living within me.
Cheryl, O’Mama: Wow, there’s some real resonance in each of your comments. I had no idea I’d get that with this post. Thank you both for taking the time. I thought the important part of the post was how far my control of my temper had come in the last ten years. Shows what I know. 🙂
Lee: I’m so out of touch with such huge swaths of pop culture that I had to Google that. The Office is a show that people consistently mention as something I would like, though.