Archive for May, 2007

The Giant Sesame Seed

I own a giant sesame seed.

It’s one of my most-prized possessions. Certainly, not be able to go to the corner and buy another if something happens to it has something to do with why it is so precious. But, mostly, I like it because it’s so much fun.

I take it with me when I’m invited to speak to, say, all the students in one grade at a local elementary school. While those of us already there in the library are waiting for the rest of the classes to arrive, I pass it around and invite the youngsters to guess what it is.

Placemat is a common guess, which is understandable given that it’s 18 1/2 inches long and 11 inches wide. As a placemat, though, it would be on the drab side. One side is brown/orange and the other is a mottled beige.

Sooner or later, the kids give up guessing or I tire of listening to their guesses, and I tell them that it’s a giant sesame seed. After being told what it is, kids are more likely to say, “What?” than, “Of Course!”

Luckily, I also own a photograph of the Burger King Whopper hot-air balloon. So, I show the photograph to them and point out the sesame seeds. Ah! Now they get it.

The seed is a souvenir of the time I rode the Burger King Whopper hot-air balloon across Winston-Salem. After the ride, the pilot asked if I wanted a sesame seed from the first Burger King Whopper hot-air balloon, which they had cut up after it had worn out.

You bet.

At some point during our time together, I told the pilot about the time that I bungee-jumped out of a hot-air balloon. That was one of the most stupid things I could have done, he said. When you jump out of a balloon, he said, removing your weight from the basket causes it to rise. When you reach the end of the bungee cord, your momentum exerts a major downward pull on the rising ballon.

That’s when you will discover if the balloon’s fabric has any flaws in it, he said.

When he gave me the seed, I had no idea who much pleasure it would give me over the years. Early on, I just took it to events for kids. One day, I said to myself, “What are you thinking? Why deprive adults of the pleasure of seeing the giant sesame seed.”

I discovered that, if anything, adults enjoy it more than kids.

I had to keep my eye on one woman who confessed that she was lusting after it because she collects large versions of small things. That is a collection that I would like to see and that would probably have made a fun story. But I was too preoccupied with making sure that she didn’t abscond with my treasure to think to ask about setting up something.

Once, I had to stop a reading and go out into the audience to save the seed from mortal danger. I had made the mistake of letting the kids continue to pass it around after I started reading “His Dogness Finds a Blue Heart” to the audience. Two boys got into a wrestling match over it, and each was pulling hard on one end.

Since then, I make sure to retrieve my sesame seed and put it in a safe place before proceeding.