Nothing Could Be Finer Than a Trip to the Fair

Ah, Fall.

Autumn is my favorite time of year for many reasons, but I think taking my annual trip(s) to the North Carolina State Fair is in the Top Two of my favoritest reasons.

With this year’s fair in full swing it seems like Nothing Could Be Finer¹This is the NC State Fair’s slogan. Year in, and year out. It kinda feels like GroundHog Day… than regaling you with a random collection of my fair-related thoughts.

A trip to the State Fair can be an exciting adventure, especially when it comes to trying new food and riding thrilling rides.

But the quickest way to ruin all the fun is going with a large group. Whew boy, did I learn that the hard way the first year I went with my in-laws with our 6-month-old in tow.

It didn’t help that I’m a planner and my wife’s kin are more of the improvisational type. While the details of that episode don’t make for a very interesting narrative, I just want to say: Good News, Everybody! We’re still married 6 years after that incident.

Now, we could have saved ourselves much strife had I listened to the Boss Lady’s wise suggestion of just her and I coming back a separate night. Yet it wasn’t until the next year that we made another date-night like trip so we could enjoy the evening vibe of the Fair.

It was two years ago, though, with the Boss Lady 8 months pregos, that I stumbled upon a truly magical formula. Just like the time I met up with a friend for lunch at Chick-Fil-A and he ordered two sandwiches, the possibility of taking as many trips to the Fair as I ----- well pleased was a mind-blowing revelation. I fancy myself to be fairly open-minded, so I’m not sure why it took so long in either case to realize what seems obvious in retrospect.

I took three trips that year: once with my 4-year-old daughter, once with the Boss Lady, and once with my gluten-sensitive mother.

The beauty of the multiple trips is that I didn’t have to act so insecurely–yes, it is possible for a grown-ass man to act that way–about doing the things I wanted to do and trying the tasty foods I wanted to try. It was a rather liberating experience.

The best part was that I could focus on making sure my current companion enjoyed her time as much as possible, on account of my bucket-list being 1/3 of its original size.

So to bring the boring part of this post to a close, my main two fair-going tips are:

1. Two’s company and three’s a crowd: take multiple trips if possible to keep your party size to a minimum. Trying to make everyone happy usually ends up with no one being happy.
2. Make a plan with a map in hand. Fair technology usually lags behind the rest of society, but they’re starting to catch up. Still, I wouldn’t rely on the false promises of a Fair-provided smart phone app. Sort out the top 3 foods and top 3 attractions that you really want to hit up, and make sure you have a real good idea of where to find them. DO THIS BEFORE YOU GO–actually at the Fair is not the time nor place to prove your wild-goose chasing skills

I think what I love the most about the Fair is that Nothing Could Be Finer than the level of People Watching that it has to offer. If you ever fear that you might be living inside of a bubble, there’s nothing like a State Fair to re-educate you.

There are several games you can play here, and can be even more fun with a partner.

My personal favorite is assessing the “economics of couples,” for lack of a better term.

Questions to ask:

• Do they look like they belong together?
• Which one is out of their league?
• Which one is settling?
• Perhaps they are well-matched and/or deserve each other?

Relationships, whether we want to admit it or not, are largely transactional. If there seems to be a noticeable relational economic imbalance, try to imagine what hidden variables there might be that could make that particular pairing make more sense.

A sampling of theorems:

• Is he packing some serious heat in his pantalones?
• Alcohol.
• Alcohol-induced kid.
• Does he make a lot more money than he looks like he does?
• Perhaps personality does matter?
• Unreliable contraception.
• Maybe the classic “light vehicular manslaughter/blackmail” combo?
• The only limit is your imagination!

Another fun activity is taking turns pointing out random people and trying to guess, on a scale of 1 to 10, what level of executive function they possess. Do they appear to have a history of making good life choices? Or, are the like one hapless chap I encountered last year…

I had gone to use the restroom, and was doing my thang at the long row of urinals when in walks a young guy holding a hot dog in one of those coffee-filter-like hot dog napkin/holders.

He steps up to the urinal, and I can’t help but notice out of the corner of my eye that he is hesitant about something. I recoiled in horror as I realize that he decided that he had no choice but to put his hot dog on the floor by his feet while he whizzed only inches above.

I watched him as finished his business, shook off the PVD,²Post-void drip, because I know you were wondering. retrieve his dog from the ground, and take a bite on his way out the door.

I keep running that series of unfortunate events through my mind, re-contextualizing it as one of those “Noooooooo!” scenes from an action/war movie where a character lunges towards the bomb/grenade in a last milli-second attempt to advert explosive disaster.

I feel like it was a moral failure on my part letting him eat that hot dog. Had I been quick on my feet (and on the zip), I should have smacked it out of his hands before…ugh, I can’t even type it without having to choke down a little bit of vomit. Anyways, in this alternate universe in my head, I would have also kindly bought him a replacement one.

…’cuz if your life is such that you’re going to piss on your hot dog and still eat it, you deserve every ounce of compassion I can mustard up.

I find that I often get lost in my own head when People Watching. Well, maybe it’s more akin to the Five Stages of Grief. Therefore, I present to you The Six Stages of People Watching:

• Stage 1: Shock. Remember what I said about stepping outside your bubble? I mean, holy shit, though. There are some specimen that I’m stunned to discover that they even exist. You know, people that I never imagined possible. And I’m always amazed by the incredible diversity…of white people, in particular.
• Stage 2: Gratitude. In a brief moment of clarity, I’ll have a fleeting thought of just how ----- fortunate I am. No, I’m not saying that everyone at the Fair is a bunch of sad sacks. Rather, it’s just that when I behold the spectrum and distribution of all the human experiences represented at the Fair, it is clear that in spite of perceived imperfections, my lot in life has been more than most people could ever hope for. It’s a humbling experience.
• Stage 3: Disappointment. While I actually had a decent chance of finding “my people” on the Fairy Farm,³See: Finding Yourself on the Fairy Farm. there ain’t no way in hell I’m going to find them in the cultural haystack that is the Fair. Or, more likely, I would find them but not realize it because I would be in too much denial, saying “NO. I am nothing at all like that guy…who is essentially my doppelganger in both body and character…who also has a half-Asian honey hanging off his arm…why is she even with that chump…wait a minute…uh, let’s just move on to judging the next couple.”⁴Goddamn you, Funhouse Mirrors.
• Stage 4: Condescension. If you’ve read enough of my musings around here, you know that I often implore all y’all of us to be non-judgemental in spirit.⁵See, for example, Lawnmower Man or A Pound Casual AssHat. Understand that most of the time, I’m preaching at myself. My ability to be a judgy pompous ----- is usually limited in scope under normal circumstances. But get me on some fairgrounds and you best stand back, or else you’re going to be feeling a gust of my air of superiority to yo’ face. If I were to enter into a mockery skills competition at the Fair, I no doubt would be taking home a Best in Show ribbon. There’s just too many opportunities to pass up…
• Stage 5: Self-loathing. Without fail, I will achieve some unwelcome self-awareness in the midst of Stage 4. It’s never fun to realize how shitty you really can be.
• Stage 6: Acceptance. Eventually I find some stasis, and learn to live with myself. The key is to acknowledge that, like everyone else I’ve encountered during my excursions to the Fair, I too am a complex and nuanced mixed bag of goodies, worthy of at least a little bit of self-grace.

I’ll end this with a tale that I guess technically falls under the People Watching motif.

First off, it needs to be understood that I’m a borderline cheapskate, so the fact I’m able handle all the wastes of money that the Fair has to offer is an accomplishment in and of itself. I’ve learned to relax and blow a little dough on the foods, but I’m still pretty resistant to spend money on rides, games, or other such non-sense.

Several years back, the Boss Lady and I were enjoying a rare baby-free evening at the Fair, when we found ourselves romantically wandering to no place in particular.

Passing through the Midway, we saw several Ripley’s-Believe-It-Or-Not type mini-attractions. The World’s Tallest Horse, the Bearded Lady–largely scoffable stuff like that. “There may be a sucker born every minute, but you mother ----- aren’t getting a dollar out of me!” I proclaimed loudly in my head.

We came across the World’s Tiniest Woman, advertised to be something like only 2 feet tall. For some reason, we said “Screw it! It’s worth $1 each to call their bluff!” We each paid our dollar, and filed in and around to where this tiny human being was supposed to be.

Now, I really don’t know what I was expecting. Maybe some sort of obvious and cheap optical illusion using mirrors and lenses? I’m not sure.

But when I came around the corner, I guess I wasn’t expecting to see a real live woman.

Yet, laying in a basket was a real live woman.

She seemed to have some genetic disease and appeared to have severely stunted growth, but nothing like the to-scale tiny person with tiny head, etc. that I thought they were advertising. Oh, and I believe she was an amputee to boot⁶No pun intended.–which I kinda felt like was cheating a bit. After all they said tiniest, not shortest.

Anyways, when I came around that corner, I found myself unexpectedly making direct and deep eye contact with her.

I think it would have been a little gentler of an experience if not for that detail.

Honestly, the whole thing was a shock. She said hi to the pair of us, but all I could do was stumble out of there in a bit of a daze.

We talked about the experience for the rest of the night, as there was a lot to unpack.

Neither of us realized that we were literally walking into a situation where a real person was going to be turned into a money-making spectacle. We simply weren’t emotionally prepared to be partaking in the patron side of a what was essentially a classic freak show. Had we known that we would be implicitly mocking and ostracizing someone, we most assuredly would have passed on the experience.

On the other hand…the Boss Lady made an excellent point that she (the World’s Tiniest Woman) had the opportunity to make a living for herself, and that our $2 could be seen as contributing to a decent enough cause.

And of course there was the whole issue of making inadvertent eye contact. We agreed that it was one of those moments were the awkward thought dominating your mind is “I don’t know where to look…”

I think we both would have been fine, had we known what we were getting into. After all, if one were being thoughtful, loving, and compassionate, then eye contact is probably one of the most dignified and respectful things we could have given her.

The problem was, however, that she could no doubt see the cognitive dissonance in our eyes, as we grappled with reconciling our skeptical expectations with the reality in front of us. It was basically breezing through Stages 1, 3, & 5 in under a second.

And even to this day still, I’m not quite sure I ever reached Stage 6…

Content created on: 23 October 2019 (Wednesday)

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