Where Have All The Carnies Gone...

We spent an evening at the Virginia State Fair over this past weekend. Loved the little jugs of sweet tea, the smell of chicken poop, and witnessing baby chicks hatch. Didn't love the lack of down-home-ness. Don't get me wrong. It was good. It was fun. It was yummy (fair food, duh). It just seemed a bit commercial. In one of the animal tents, there were people gathered on a small grandstand watching.... a video of a cow giving birth. I kid you not. And are multiple Verizon Wireless kiosks needed at the fair? Am I really going to review mobile phone plans while nibbling on a funnel cake and swigging heartily from my jug of sweet tea. Probably not. And am I the only one that loathes the whole heckling thing in the "we are selling stuff" pavilion? I would have enjoyed more hand-crafted items (and was a bit put off  that arts & crafts were housed in the same building as the "we are selling stuff" stuff, but that's a different story). If you are selling something you bought in bulk over the internet, you should not be allowed to peddle it at the fair. What happened to getting my name burned onto a piece of wood or a leather belt? Granted, there was a very talented guy crafting hand-woven baskets, but he was way off by himself in a poultry tent, and in my honest opinion, deserved a much better venue than someone selling hot tubs or furniture polish.

One thing the fair did do was take me back (the older I get, the more "taken back" situations I seem to find myself in). Flashback to middle school. Sonoma-Marin Fair in Petaluma. Early 80s. "Tainted Love" blasted from the huge speakers at the Flying Bobs ride. Standing at the back of a crowd, tiptoeing to get a glimpse of Eddie Money singing 'Shakin'. Being able to roam the fairgrounds without a parent. Dr Pepper lipgloss and dusty Vans. Getting to fully experience heckling from the carnies (so much creepier without my mom around). Something about going to the fair at that age hinted at the fact that I was on the verge of a whole new world opening up to me. And I loved it. And no, I never won a cheap stuffed animal or half-dead goldfish in a plastic bag sealed with a rubber band. But it was still pretty magical...  

Having been inspired, awed, intimidated, and frankly overwhelmed with the number of "ooh, I want to follow that one" blogs out there (alone with that gnawing sense of 'incomplete' if I don't check in with my faves every few days), I thought it might be time to try a post of my own. Nothing major, just ramblings from a (trying not to sound like a personal ad, but really sounding like a personal ad anyways) divorced, mother of two, 9-to-5-office-dwelling, wannabe-crafting and all "do-it-yourself-ing", people-watching, book-reading, music-loving, general-enjoyer-of-the-little-things person who finds herself approaching middle age faster than she ever thought possible. I was so sure I was going to be the first human being to somehow avoid the aging process and stay young forever. What the hell happened?

So, I'm going to pretend (at this point, prolly not really necessary to pretend, seeing as no one knows about this endeavor) that I'm just writing it for myself, to hash out some of the stuff that happens to me and some of the stuff that tends to get trapped in my head until I can 1) totally forget about them because there's so much other stuff going on, or 2) express them to someone else (kinda like regurgitating, minus the baby birds). I think life is pretty amusing most of the time. And I wish more people appreciated that fact. And I think that 'amusing' and 'annoying' are separated by a super fine line, a line that depends on my current mood or energy level. 

The only difference from this and every journal I have ever owned (and there have been many), will be that I can't just rip out the pages and throw them away. And then pretend that I'm starting off my journal brand new (for the millionth time). And now that I'm (erm) older and (derr) wiser, I honestly wish I had kept every single, crumpled up page. 

So there.

But I gotta warn you. You will have to hear stories about these characters...

But it's ok...We have lots of good stories. Not like "Oh my goodness! Nathan tripped over his shoelace today and skinned his knee! I couldn't decide between Bactine and Neosporin. It was horrible." Nah, nothing like that. It'll be more along the lines of "Alice likes to capture and torture fairies" (see below)...