Kids with sticky fingers and a mess of icecream on their lips ran around in circles near my feet, seemingly playing tag. The small-town band sang the lyrics of an unfamiliar country song, wailing and jiving their hips. The members must have been in their late thirties or forties. Lights blinked on and off in front of dirty game stands, their owners leaning in boredom against the counter, caring very little if they recieved business from those sticky little kids or not. Skeeball. Basketball. Duck grab. Win a free fish. I swear, those goldfish that you win by tossing the ball in the glass jar...those suckers live forever. Everyone seems to think that they will die around the same time you pull into your driveway, but I swear, they are immune to death. Even if you never feed them. A ferris wheel squeaked round and round carrying people with death wishes and ride-night wristbands. The bright yellow slide sent screaming children on burlap sacks to their parents, who talked hurriedly on cell phones at the bottom. Rap music blared obtrusively from the dark innards of the alien spaceship. I still don't know what the name of that ride is...or if it has a formal name at all. I've always just called it the alien spaceship. People walk by eating hot sausages, cheesesteaks, fries. Cotton candy, funnel cakes, caramel apples.
I've always been amused by our small town carnival. We also have a fair, which is much larger and great for people-watching and gross-animal-petting, but the carnival comes first and lasts for a week. So, I feel it my duty, my obligation, to attend the carnival and people-watch. I would have brought my camera, but I hear that's a bit creeper-ish. That never stopped me before. What's better than catching strangers in their natural habitat? Especially in black and white?
As I stand there, pretending to listen to the band (which I have to say would have been tolerable if I enjoyed country twang), I do what I do best. I watch. I listen. I probably stare more than I should, but only my good friends call me on that. I should probably nix that habit before going over to foreign countries...
-Tweens pull their friends' wrists, talking animatedly about who showed up to the carnival tonight, and who seems to be absent. Apparently their relationship status on Facebook depends on which grungy guy gives them the hairy eyeball.
-Grandmothers huddle together at a table, eating pie and sipping milkshakes. I vow to one day be like those peaceful-looking older ladies. Who wouldn't want to sip a milkshake and converse about the latest perm-gone-bad over cherry pie?
-Sweaty boys dip fried foods in hot grease, shaking salt/powdered sugar/what have you on each sold item.
-My sister pokes me with tears in her eyes and tells me a heart-breaking story about how she found a dollar on the ground and now daddy won't trade her four quarters to put in the claw machine so she can win an ipod. I take her dollar and give it to the soda stand guy who in turn gives me four shiny quarters back. I place those in her palm and she leads me eagerly to the Claw.
-I run into two girls who graduated with me, and we briefly talk about the murky waters near each of our campuses, and what we are currently majoring in. It was very enlightening.
-Groups, lots of groups, congregating everywhere like buzzing flies.
-I meander through the throngs of people, my sister's hand tucked safely into mine, and point to different rides that are sure to break down while we are watching them. Our pure and honest stares are breaking the nuts and bolts of the grimy machines, I am sure of it. I promise that we will both get wristbands for thursday night and wait in line for these death-ridden, completely dangerous carnival rides. I live for the thrill of every squeak and churn of grinding rusty metal. She eagerly agrees with me and I know at that moment that she must me my miniature sisterly soulmate.
-A boy with a sly smile playing on his lips leads a girl behind one of the dirty game stands. Some things are not meant to be seen.
If I would have taken a journal with me, or my camera (set on black and white), I could have recorded many more observations. But I saw what I could, and remembered what stuck out the most. Sometimes a situation can't be fully remembered, but what you do remember is surely what you felt at the time.
"Discovery consists of looking at the same thing as everyone else and thinking something different." - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
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