Hendersonville, N.C.
Someone told me about the video of Bill Iffrig, a 78-year-old runner who was knocked down by the bombing blast at the Boston Marathon on April 15. I hadn’t seen it myself, so I uploaded it on YouTube. I found a specific presentation in super-slow motion. Two times, I sifted through the gruesome event.
It was during the second viewing that I noticed something remarkable. In the immediate aftermath of the despicable blast, someone in the stands adjacent to the bombing released three attached yellow balloons. At first the simple beauty of those balloons took me aback. They were seemingly pulled toward the blast as if the force sucked them in, but then, escaping the billowing white smoke and the casualties beneath it, the balloons floated innocently toward the heavens.
The balloons brought a sense of comfort, calm and reflection to the horribly erratic scene below. Out of that chaos, the three attached balloons softly sailed up and away.
I was reminded of the three individuals who were killed in the two blasts: 8-year-old Martin Richard, 29-year-old Krystle Campbell and 23-year-old Lu Lingzu, a Chinese graduate student from Boston University. I do not know who may have released the balloons; I’m sure I would have let them go, too, having heard and felt the effects of such a powerful blast, but the balloons only performed their function, floating upward into the atmosphere.
Through this tragedy at the 2013 Boston Marathon, the color yellow screams out a message to us all. Lu’s country of China’s color is yellow. Huangdi, the founder of the Chinese civilization, is known as the Yellow Emperor. The color yellow stimulates the mental processes and nervous system. Additionally, it activates the memory and encourages communication.
The three yellow balloons should remind us to never forget what happened in Boston and encourage us to exchange ideas about caring and understanding. And of course, yellow can represent cowardice, such as the yellow bellies who premeditated the hideous act upon innocent people during the marathon. We should always be aware of evil and its insistence to interfere with the peaceful interactions in our lives.
Campbell’s death draws our attention to the yellow crystal that symbolizes warmth and comfort. Yellow crystals furnish power to solidify new interests and new relationships. They help us to see things in new ways and to become enlightened. They add clarity, zest, optimism and meaning to our lives and relationships. Yellow crystals are helpful in restoring balance to the solar plexus chakra. Located in the area of the solar plexus, navel and the digestive system, the fiery third chakra is called Manipura, the lustrous yellow crystal.
Just as tragic is the premature death of Richard. When children are taken from us, the yellow light of the sun dims and our hearts suffer in the shadows. Our countenances pale. A spokesperson at Richard’s school system prepared a statement about him that reflects the light in his young life: “Martin was a bright, energetic young boy who had big dreams and high hopes for his future.”
The three victims of Boston were attached by the color yellow, and they all floated away in the blasts of the marathon. Angels of God gently lifted these souls out of this chaos, and even provided evidence in a video.