The Red Balloon

So, today I was on the playground with Nina's class, something that doesn't happen often. It's fun to watch her in action at school. She's pretty feisty- she can handle herself in a crowd just fine.

A teacher brought out a bunch of little colored balls for the kids to play with.  The boys decided that they would have total control over who got which balls, so when Nina took a red one they shouted- Hey! She got one.... Get her!! I was keeping an eye on the situation, thinking she would just hand it over and be done with it. But no- she took off, running as fast as her little legginged legs would take her.  She's pretty fast- she had a bunch of about 7 boys, all about a year older than her, trying to catch her, and they couldn't.  When she suddenly fell I thought, ok, this is over now... But she got right up, glanced over her shoulder and took off again, looking determined and a little bit angry.

Then something hit me- she was the boy Pascal in the movie The Red Balloon.  In her head, the little red ball was her balloon, and the boys were the bullies who were trying to get it from her.  When she seemed to be getting a little too breathless, I grabbed her and swung her around and said- Was that fun? She said- Yep! I was pretending they were the bullies trying to take away my red balloon!

I asked her if she was afraid of the bullies- she said, No. I was just thinking about kicking them if they took my balloon away....

(Atta girl!)