Monday, September 24, 2007

Two Faces of the Farmington Fair - part 1

You’ve got your fried food and traditional rides, gluttony and tackiness and rides intended to scare the pants off of you (just watching some of them nearly makes me ill). That is of course the overriding theme of the fair, presumably of most fairs.



Alden said, at one point, “why have we never been to a fair before?” I wasn’t really even sure what the answer was to this question. I am sure there were fairs in Colorado. But, indeed, we had never before taken him to such an event. Fairs seem to hold some sort of allure, and yet, going to this one, I found myself wondering why… unless you are wanting to do some ethnographic study type thing, in which case the fair seems like a site just ripe with potential, I think the fair ends up just being a bit depressing, and also pretty damn expensive.



On the other hand, I have to remember what it might look like through a child’s eyes, and then, perhaps, it really is magical. I think Alden had a pretty good time. Not so sure about Milo!



The ferris wheel was a kick, and it was pretty fun to see expansively, and from up high. I find myself a wee bit afraid of heights in my adulthood…. But I was able to push back the rising anxiety and pretty much enjoy the ride.


I suppose one reason we have never gone to a fair (in Alden’s memory – I have of course been to fairs in the past), is that they were never right there. The Farmington Fairgrounds are about a mile from our house. We were sorry to miss the Demolition Derby, which happened over the weekend, when we were gone in Canada. But, there was a warm up smaller scale one earlier in the week, and we could hear it pretty well from our backyard.

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