Michael T. Mondak speaks about community events

For many years I have held the belief that if your community event does not have anyone handing out helium balloons to the children, then you don’t really have a community event.

You will never see me playing hardball with event committees who have had me handing out helium balloons for many years.  I am too invaluable to the success of the Hermitage Arts Festival because whenever the dates are announced, I am always one of the first to commit to it.  The Buhl Day committee always pays me money to hand out helium balloons to the children every year in Buhl Park on Buhl Day.

Even with this, there is just one event committee I continue to play hardball with because my beliefs on community events do not align with theirs:  Waterfire in Sharon.  In 2014 I made an attempt to have the opportunity to hand out helium balloons to the children at Waterfire, even going as far to suggest it during the Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions I emceed in July 2014.   However, even with this suggestion I made on camera, it did not work out because I had been told that the original organizers in Providence, Rhode Island never intended for a carnival-style atmosphere.  For this reason I continue to play hardball with the Waterfire committee more than ten years later by completely avoiding the area around downtown Sharon on the two Saturdays it is held.  I also play hardball by asking people to refrain from bringing up the subject of Waterfire in my presence.

If you are on an event committee and your beliefs about a community event aligns with my beliefs about requiring someone to hand out helium balloons to the children, then I will show up whenever my schedule allows.  If your event has never had someone handing out helium balloons to the children, but you want someone to do so, then you may invite me and I will clear my schedule.  However, if our beliefs are in conflict with each other, then expect me to play hardball with you, because I am The Balloon Man and I can play hardball too.