The luminous ineffability of being

So I'm at this ritzy art gallery for the opening of Ascherman's show. Even though the images are graphic and sexual, there's a certain sense of humor to all of it and that fact is underscored by the balloon-clown artist/performer who is inflating balloons and twisting them into butterflies and flowers and monkeys on motorcycles.

But the "Flower Clown" has a sophisticated sense of humor as well. Hence, in the spirit of the event, he's twisted up a couple of nude, anatomically correct humans to add to the menagerie. They are utterly adorable and I love them.

"Can I take a couple of these?" I ask the Flower Clown. "I'd like to post a picture of them on my blog."

"Sure," he says whilst twisting a yellow balloon into a tuft of pubic hair. "Take a matched set." He offers me an Adam and Eve duo. I thank him, promise to link his site in the associated post, and set my new friends upon a side table.

"These are taken," I announce to no one in particular before sucking back into the group in order to mingle and finish my wine.

A few minutes later, I ready myself to leave and collect my little nudies, which are waiting patiently for me where I'd left them. Other than braving a bit of a chill in the air, I do not anticipate any difficulty in transporting the balloon dolls from the posh gallery to my car.

Right-o.

Enter the phenomenon known commonly as static electricity and the odd friction of the surface of an inflated balloon. Add to these inarguable truths my earlier decision not to wear my hair in a massive knot atop my head for this occasion, but instead to wear it down--all 30 inches of it.

Do I even have to tell you what happens next? Can the reader not predict the unfortunate scene? Can he not imagine long wafting strands of Erin hair floating lovingly towards the naked balloon people? Is the marriage of said hairs and the dubious balloon surfaces not inevitable? And is it not all together appropriate that the Erin hairs would wind their way around the myriad cracks and crevices of the naked balloon people?

So it is, dear reader, how I found myself in a stylish art gallery, surrounded by stylish people, all of whom had good reason to momentarily stop looking at the sexually explicit photographs on the walls and pause to look at Erin O'Brien, Girl Writer, as she laughed and mumbled things like, "heh, heh, guess I need a haircut," and tried to untangle the naked balloon people from her copious tresses.

My initial effort to extract my hair from the balloon people just made the situation worse. Then there was the matter of my purse, which I had to set down as I held the balloon people in careful relation to my head as not to pull too hard on the hair tethers.

"It's just a bit ... uh, ha, ha, stuck is all." Everyone sort of grinned at me with heads tilted and brows furrowed. Eventually, I freed my little nudies and exited the scene with any number of bemused eyes trailing after me.

Now I am here, wild hair corralled into a tight bun, delivering this cautionary tale unto you. So heed these words, dear reader and go forth. Do right, know light and let not your hair become tangled around a naked balloon man in a ritzy art gallery.