County Fairs

We went to the Fulton County Fair on Sunday. The fair is one of the truly great things about the rural area where I spent my childhood. That there are basically no other great things is why I don't live there now.

Still, the website doesn't do it justice. This is a true country fair. They have buildings packed full of livestock, horse shows, a building full of floral displays, needlepoint and quilts, arts and crafts, another full of homegrown fruits and vegetables. It's a tradition there to gather up the best of whatever it is you do best, and enter it in the fair.

I drag my kids from place to place, exclaiming at all the different varieties of chickens (as though we've never seen them before), wondering how we can ever eat a turkey after staring at them eye to eye (we get over that by November.) We pet bunnies, and horses. (Watch their ears! That one will bite!) Every time we walk through the goat and sheep barn, I tell my son the story AGAIN about when he was in his stroller, and got scared half to death by a big loud BAA!! in his face by a sheep, and how he wouldn't go back in that building for the next few years.

My kids of course go to ride rides. Unfortunately they're at an awkward age now, too big for the little kids' rides, but with a mother who is too neurotic to let them ride most of the big rides. (Hello, they put them up yesterday?! All it's going to take is one loose bolt and that flying thing will be flying right on down the midway!) So they mostly end up riding the bumper cars over and over.

I am a grown-up so of course I go for the food. We have a routine. First, we go to the french fry booth. Not all the others that offer fries but rather THE booth, the same one in the same place with the same fries (maybe even the same grease) in a paper cup I have been eating every year since I can remember. Next to that is the Dairy Barn for milk shakes and THEN to the Beef Farmers' Booth for either a roast beef or rib eye sandwich. (Sympathy for steers rarely enters into the equation. Steers are big and rather un-cute, plus when they're in their stalls all you see is their butts.) Before we leave, we get a box of fresh donuts from the Band Boosters under the Grandstands. The Grange people also grill up the best chicken halves anywhere so I usually grab one of those to go, too.

When we were kids, we all did 4-H. I started off taking sewing??? All I can come up with is my girl cousins did it, so I did too. Once. Then we had lambs. You care for your lamb all summer, feed it, keep records of the expenses involved. Before the fair, someone comes and shears it of its wool. Then you care for it all week at the fair and take it to the required lamb show. Then at the end of the week everyone takes their sheep (and other livestock) to the jr fair auction where various businesses pay higher than market price for your 4-H project. Afterwards you say goodbye to your little friends, knowing they're headed off to become someone's dinner, and collect a check. Farm kids are a tough lot.