Dear Grapevine

Hope floats          



One cold, rainy night, I was driving home from my AA meeting through rural Minnesota when I noticed a balloon floating in the sky across a plowed field. For some unknown reason I stopped my car and chased down the balloon. After a 50-yard dash, I managed to catch it. There was a note attached from a student in Kansas with a pledge to abstain from alcohol, along with her name and the address of her elementary school.



I wrote her a note back telling her how I was on my way home from my AA meeting when I found her note. I wished her luck in keeping her pledge. I told her I was a recovering alcoholic and hoped she would never have to have the problems I had experienced. 



Two weeks later, I received a wonderful letter from her school principal. “Your letter was very powerful,” the principal wrote. “I have a brother who’s been struggling with this disease and I know how tough it can be. Thank you for your letter. I read it to the entire school.”