My mother, aunt, and uncle grew up in what was technically a suburb but was really the country. They had cornfields on two sides of their house and a neighbor who raised bantam chickens. Every year, the township Volunteer Fire Company held a carnival the second or third week of September. My mother, Aunt Pooh, and Uncle Hank had always gone and years later they would take me and my cousins.
The carnival was held in a large field in back of the firehouse. A policeman would direct you to a parking spot in the beaten down grass and you hoped the ground wouldn’t be muddy. As soon as you got out of the car, you could smell the carnival: pierogies frying, the cotton candy swirling in its machine, the pony ride ponies simply smelling like ponies.
We were all supposed to stay together, which meant that the older ones had to stand around while the younger ones went on the baby rides and the younger cousins had to wait while the others did the flying swings and the house of mirrors. I’d like to say we did this without complaining, but I know you wouldn’t believe me. Aunt Pooh had told us stories about children who wandered off from their families and were never seen again. That scared some of us, but later my cousin Jimmy pointed out that maybe the children had run away with the carnival, which didn’t seem so bad.
When it got dark, the strings of lights went on. Local bands would play on the stage – country music or tributes to whatever rock group was popular. The younger children would dance, while the older ones stood around and said how corny it was and then went on to talk about how corny the world was.
I liked to wait until it got dark to go on the Ferris wheel. It seemed braver to go up in the dark and feel you were in the sky yourself in the middle of the stars.
Towards the end of the evening, a man would be shot out of a cannon. We would spend the ride home talking about whether we would want to do that and arguing whether girls could be human cannon balls.
The carnival is still going on, and naturally Ed and I try to take the kids every year. They sit in the back seat playing video games and asking if we are there yet. Ed, who can be quite literal at times, says, “No. We are on the way. If we were there the car wouldn’t be moving.”
“What if you’re parking the car? Is that being there?”
Josh had him on that.
“It depends on what you mean by being and what you mean by there.”
But eventually we are there, the car is parked and we are in the middle of the crowds and smells and noise. The kids are discussing what they are going to eat, but I tell them they should go on the rides first. They are still the same, including the “sit down ride.” After Ed took Betsey and Josh on it last year, he had to sit down. It’s one of their favorite stories, although, as Betsey pointed out, it would have been better if Ed had thrown up.
Then, of course, we have to eat, after we have walked around to see what’s available, so that no one gets stuck with something after they’ve seen something better, stopping at the game booths to try to win stuffed animals or tee shirts or outdated video games. Cilla wins six stuffed animals at the skill crane, with Betsey and Josh cheering her on as Ed and I hand out the money. I end up carrying them for the rest of the night. Fortunately, I have some plastic bags in my pocket that I keep for Duke’s walks.
Finally it is time to go home. Topics of discussion during the ride home are:
Why do they have only the sucky red candy apples and not the caramel ones?
Why wouldn’t working for a carnival be a good career choice, since you could probably go on the rides for free? (Because carnival workers don’t have health insurance.)
Are the ponies being exploited?
How many times did everyone see the ponies go to the bathroom?
Why do we say that animals “go to the bathroom” when they don’t have bathrooms, except, of course, those cats that are trained to use the toilet or cats whose litter boxes are in the bathroom?
Why don’t they shoot people out of cannons any more, or did I make that up?
By the time we get home, Cilla is asleep and even Betsey and Josh are rubbing their eyes. Ed leads Cilla upstairs and tucks her in with her new stuffed animals.
I give Betsey and Josh some cocoa and then herd them up the stairs.
“Do you think they might shoot somebody out of a cannon next year?” Josh asks.
“Do you think they might have caramel apples?” Betsey wonders.
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