A DAY OFF

Last week, I saw my neighbor as we each let our respective dogs out for their respective business.

“Morning!”, he yelled.
“Morning”, I returned.
“You got any jobs today?” (He knows all too well about my balloon entertainment business. His kids get huge sculptures on their birthdays. And his association hires me for their annual tradeshow.)
“No, I don’t have any bookings today.”
“Yea, I took the day off too. Great to have a three-day weekend, isn’t it?”
“Sure.”

I thought about that for a while; a three-day weekend? I’ve got bookings Friday night, all day Saturday and most of Sunday. I’ve got to prep for the weekend’s jobs, send out contracts for future jobs, proposals to write to potential clients, emails to send to the people I met at the last networking event, signed contracts to log into the database, expense receipts to update in Quickbooks, revise my website, return phone messages. Plus, I wanted to work on three or four balloon designs that have been bouncing around my head.

A balloon decorator friend and I were discussing our backward lives. She made the observation that we are the only people who look forward to Mondays. Odd as that may sound to people in the “cubicle world”, Mondays are usually a day of rest after several days of driving, inflating, tying, twisting, setting up, breaking down, following Mapquest directions, entertaining audiences and dealing with clients. Who knew having so much fun could be so exhausting.

While our clients and customers see us making balloons and making people happy, nobody sees the ugly behind-the-scenes work that goes into making those beautiful balloons. This is true of most event-oriented businesses. We work hard so others can enjoy their happy occasions.