remembering good times from days gone by….

The Fair…

My oldest daughter and I took two of the grand kids to the fair yesterday. We had a wonderful time even though the weather was so hot and sticky for a day in late September and sweat continuously rolled down my back the entire time. But that isn’t the topic today. Being with my family and enjoying the fair I have been going to my whole life is … It is weird how you can go to something and see it differently depending on who you are with at the time. Seeing anything through the eyes of a child is always an experience, but seeing the fair of my youth through the eyes of my grandchildren is truly an eye opening one indeed.

The fair has changed, so has everything in my life. We age and things change. It’s a fact of life. Do we really expect everything to stay the same for 50 or 60 years? That isn’t even feasible nor do I think we would want it to. I think having the kids with me reminded me of when I was like them and everything was new and exciting. You don’t have anything to compare it to at that young age, so you just enjoy it. The kids don’t say “why isn’t the burger stand we loved still here” or “I loved that other pizza, what happened to that”… They had both burgers and pizza and didn’t compare them to the ones from long ago, they just enjoyed the ones they were eating today.

I went to the fair with my parents and sister back in the day. We enjoyed going and looked forward to it every year. I would eat myself silly(yes, the burgers and the pizza) and always.. always left with a chameleon pinned to my shirt. It would barely live until we got home, but I so loved those poor little things. Then of course I was a teen ager and couldn’t go with my parents any longer so I went with my friends. We dressed up for the fair, we all wore our wool bermuda shorts, fur blend sweaters, knee high socks and penny loafers. It didn’t matter if the temperature was 89 degrees, that is what we wore. Oh yes, we were very cool back then…and oh so fashionable and trendy…  But, we also cared about how we looked and didn’t have half our body hanging out for the world to see or leggings so tight they look like skin.

“The heart, like the mind, has a memory. And in it are kept the most precious keepsakes. ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I remember taking my own children to the fair. They loved it and we at one point lived less than a block away so we went almost every day. I told the grands a few stories of their aunts and their Daddy’s days at the fair… which of course they loved hearing. My youngest loved the chameleons too and had one for quite awhile… unbelievably, until it’s inevitable demise. She was crushed of course and buried it in the back yard with it’s head sticking out so she could still see it. Their Daddy would play the game where you would throw pennies and later dimes into glasses and then win all the glasses that you somehow managed to get money into. Needless to say, my supply of glasses were endless. I can still see him walking proudly in the door, arms loaded with a bazillion glasses, and a big smile on his face. I still have many of those glasses to this day.

I think running into friends and family members at the fair was the best part of all. The food, the rides, the side shows…oh the side shows were awesome…but running into family and friends was truly the best back then. That is still the best part for me and yesterday was no different. We met up with family and a few friends and it brought back even more memories for me. We met up with my niece, of course she is all grown up with a fiancé now, but as I looked at her I saw her as a little girl asking me to help her play a game of shooting water into a clowns mouth. We would go to the fair in later years with my Mom, my sister and my 2 nieces and my own 3 kids. There is definitely a big hole in my heart going to the fair now without my Mom and sister who have passed. They both loved the fair, more than any 2 people I know and they went every day it was in town. So to go there without them is hard. And I fully expect to see them pop out any minute as we walk along the midway. But of course that doesn’t happen.

The older we get the more memories we have stored in our hearts. Sometimes those memories are fun to remember and sometimes they roll down our cheeks. Either way, we have them and cherish each and every one… One day I will recall taking these two young children to the fair and telling them the stories I told them yesterday. One day when they are much older….And on that day maybe they will remember me as they take children of their own to the fair.

Do you love going to the fair or anywhere with your kids or grandkids and sharing stories of the past with them?

“Life is a beautiful collage of precious moments and memories, which when pieced all together creates a unique treasured masterpiece.” ~ Melanie M. Koulouris