Going Away

It's hard... and I have no words right now.

Fair Fotos

I've been tied up with a couple of things and expect to be for a while longer. In the mean time, let me treat you to some lovely photos from the fair...

This is a photo of the Roundhouse and it's where we usually start our journey. The Roundhouse is filled with stuff entered by people, twenty years old and older - things like presumably home grown flowers and produce and, as you can see, an abundance of various arts and craft-like objects. Each of these arts and craft-like objects are judged based on some unknown (to me) criteria. Those deemed worthy are awarded a ribbon of various colors and a small check, thus refunding a portion of their Fair entry fee.

Here is a display of some canned (technically, "jarred") vegetables (and maybe some fruits) - each entered by a whole bunch of people, none of which were me. I took the picture just because I liked the way it looked

Upstairs, along with arts and craft-like objects, people enter photographs. This is one of several that Helaina entered.

I spotted this thing on the upper floor, and to be honest with you, I took the picture because at the time, I thought it was pretty funny. But I keep coming back to it, and the more I look at it, the more I like it. This thing has a lot of personality and whoever made it put a lot of passion into it. And even though I find it interesting, I’m not even sure what it it is. I’m thinking it’s either a Totoro or a 3D representation of a Picasso painting. Whatever it is, it should have won first place in the Arts and Craft-like Division.

Here's another picture taken from the upstairs of the Roundhouse.

A lovely display of allegedly locally grown apples.

Normally, we go to the youth version of the Roundhouse, where people nineteen and under submit their creations. But this year, Sam wanted to see the racing pigs, so we had to hustle on over to make the first show. When we first go there, we were the only ones there so the Master of Ceremonies, or whatever you might call him, said there may only be one race since the crowd was so small (i.e.: Sam and me). Fortunately, more people showed up so it was off to the races!

At one point, they brought out the star of the show, "Swifty." Swifty’s talent is that he or she swims - somewhat on command.The ringmaster put Swifty on a platform where an obviously reluctant Swifty had no intention of diving into a tank of cold water at ten o'clock on a chilly and overcast Saturday morning. Instead, Swifty reacted as any normal person or pig would and pooped right where he or she stood. Under similar circumstances, this would have been my exact reaction as well - crowd or no crowd. Unlike me though, Swifty eventually jumped into the water and made the swim. All in all, a great show, and well worth getting up early for!

After the pig races, it was back to explore the junior art and craft-like entries. Sam had several entries, some of which won ribbons.

One of his things that won a ribbon was this scarecrow that he made. This thing sat on the rocking chair in our living room for a week or two before the fair - and creeped out anybody that came into the room and caught sight of it out of the corner of their eye - all to great delight of Sam.

I brought Sam’s Fair entries up for him and on that particular day, one of the ladies that was working there had a doberman which wouldn’t stop barking and snarling at this thing the entire time I was there. I had half expected to see this thing torn to shreds by the time we got to the fair, but no, as you can see, it looks perfectly healthy (relatively speaking.) Currently it’s sitting inside my garage, hopefully keeping the skunks away.

After looking at the Junior entries, we went to check out the wildlife exhibits, including the ever popular skull display.

From there, we went over to the baby animal barn - where they are apparently having a problem with a couple of delinquent sheep who keep lighting up.

Here's a picture of a goat showing Sam his good side.

And here’s a picture of Helaina feeding a different group of young sheep, presumably kept separate to avoid the corrupting influence of  that pair of smoking delinquent sheep.

Walking down the still quiet midway under threatening skies.

What kid doesn't want play a game of chance, in the hopes of winning a giant inflatable pickle?

And here’s a typical food stand that, with the possible exception of the water, is selling a whole lot of stuff that isn't good for you.

After walking through one of the buildings (where I don’t take any pictures because I don’t want to make any eye contact and give any impression that I’m at all interested in what they’re selling), Helaina and I sat on a bench and waited for Sam come out. When he finally joined us, he shows me a charm that one of the vendors gave him. According to Sam, the vendor told him that this is “Mother Jesus” and that it will protect him if he carries it around. Okay.

After running the gauntlet of the second vendor building, we sat outside and shared our traditional Bucket o’ Fries: potatoes - deep fried in some kind of oil, salt, and plenty of ketchup - made from tomatoes and some other stuff - all products of nature! It just proves that if you look hard enough, you can eat healthy, even at a place like this!

When the fries were all gone, the rain started and we made a run for the exit (and some fried dough along the way) - so, no more pictures. But to assuage your disappointment, I’ve included a few photos, which I think I've posted before. They're from a few years ago, of the Fair at night time.

There's something exciting and mysterious - and maybe even slightly disorienting, about walking around the Fair at night time. It holds an odd kind of fascination for me.

I don’t know if it’s because it reminds me of something from when I was younger, some memory I can’t quite grasp, or some distant, hard to remember dream.

Or maybe it’s just the feeling of walking through a brightly lit, swirling kaleidoscope of colors contrasted with deep and sharply drawn shadows - all set against a soundtrack of overlapping conversations and the excited screams and carnival music that floats down from the rides above.

Whatever the reason is, it almost makes it worth it to have to put up with the crowds. Almost.

At the Fair

 

I should make mention of the fact that last week was fair week. I don't have a whole lot to say about it, at least nothing I haven't said before. I've written about it many, many times, and it really hasn't changed a lot over the last couple of years. Not for me anyway.

It starts like it does every year, with the parade on Thursday night. I would be fine with not going to the parade, but that's not really my decision. But we always go and that's fine, generally speaking. I just wish there weren't so many people there. It seems to be more packed every single year.

And I also wish there weren't so many commercial vehicles in the parade.When my older kids were small, there were a lot more floats. Yeah, there was the occasional Coca-Cola truck or the occasional oil delivery truck in the parade, but it seems like those were the exceptions. This year, the parade had what seemed like an inordinate amount of commercial vehicles, culminating in a convoy of at least a half a dozen carpet cleaning vans at the tail end of the parade. By the time they rolled on by, I was more than happy to get back home.

I will say, there were some good things this year's parade. First of all, there seemed to be an almost total lack of clowns. I’m not one of those people that are scared of clowns. That is, I’m not scared of clowns when they’re hanging out where they're hanging out – like at circuses and parades and such - as opposed to, say, standing over my bed when I wake up in the middle of the night. I just don’t find clowns to be funny. To me, they seem like they're desperate for attention.

Every year, they used to have a guy that called himself a “Clown for Jesus”, or something like that. He would march along in the parade, waving and handing out flyers and making crosses out of balloons. More than just desperation, I always found it to be vaguely disturbing in a way I could never quite articulate.

Another good thing was that there weren't as many politicians in the parade this year. In years past, it seemed like there would always be at least a few of these people scattered throughout the parade - especially if it was an election year. They would ride along in the back of a convertible or worse, they would walk the parade - smiling and waving and pointing at everyone. I once made eye contact with one of them - and he smiled and waved at me, like I had any idea who that guy was. There’s something weird about that.

On the positive side though, Sam got to see some of the people from his old school marching by. He was pretty thrilled about that. That, by itself, would have made it worthwhile - even if there had been more clowns.

On Saturday, we went to the Fair. We got there a little bit earlier than usual, due mostly to the fact that Sam wanted to see the racing pigs. If we didn't get there for the morning show, it meant we would have to hang around until after lunch to catch the next show, and staying late at the fair isn’t part of our routine.

So, we got to the fair early and did our usual walking around, looking at the displays of fruits and vegetables, and arts and crafts and photographs. And then we went over and watched the racing pigs. It was threatening rain all morning long and it was touch and go as to whether the pigs would race or not. But the rain held off and the races went on, much to Sam’s and my own relief.

From there, we continued on to the other displays – the junior versions of the displays we looked at earlier, the wildlife displays, the baby animals, and so on. We walked down the nearly empty midway, under the gloomy sky, past the food stands and the tents selling feathered cowboy hats and the games of chance, where you have little chance at all. It was all a bit like the parade in reverse, where we were the ones moving, while those on the sidelines tried to wave us in.

Down at the end of the midway, there are two long buildings, and in these buildings there are displays set up by some of those same companies that drove in the parade. One of the buildings used to be more crafts and merchandise, but over the years it seems like that building, like the other, has been taken over by more service type of industries. Inside, there are the furnace repair people and the home repair people and the people that will repair your driveway. Over the last several years, they've been joined by some anti-choice people and now, this year, there is some church group set up a little further down. I make little or no eye contact with any of these people. I’m not really interested in anything any of them are selling. But still, I walk through these buildings every year.

At the end of one of these buildings is another food stand. And every year we sit down at one of their picnic tables and get some water and share French fries before deciding what rides everyone wanted to go on. This year, we got the French fries and water but we didn’t go on any of the rides after. Sam had told me earlier that he wasn’t really interested in going on any rides and Helaina would be coming back the next day, so there was no strong interest on her part, either.

This was good, I guess, because as we walked back down the midway toward the exit, the rain that had been threatening to fall all morning long, was finally coming down. At first, it wasn’t coming down hard enough to stop us from getting some fried dough, but by the time we had it in hand, it was falling hard enough to drench us and the fried dough, all the way back to the car.

Our visit was a little bit shorter than our visit last year, and our group was a little bit smaller. But despite that, and despite my lack of affection for crowds and for the vendors and for the clowns and politicians of years past, I’m always glad that we went.

Made It

Well, we've made it through the first week of school.

I left work early to meet Sam's bus again today, just like I have all week long. And though the bus was ten minutes behind schedule in getting Sam home, it turns out that it had nothing to do with the eighty or so nightmare scenarios I had managed to come up with in those ten minutes, but instead - they were held up in heavy traffic! Who would have thought.

Next week, I guess I'm going back to my regular schedule at work and Sam will catch the bus by himself in the morning and come home by himself in the afternoon.

I'm sure this will all go fine...

Today's Brief Comment

We're still working some kinks out of Sam's bus schedule. Hopefully, this will be all set tomorrow.

The End of One Day, The Beginning of Another

The last day of summer - the fun summer, that is - has come and gone. Last night I took Sam out to the little ice cream stand at the edge of town, for our traditional Last Day of Summer Vacation ice cream cone.

I'm not sure exactly when this tradition began - maybe four or five, maybe six years ago. I did it that first year as a surprise - and to distract him from the stress of the next day. And I did it the following year for the same reason, and for the same reason in the years after that. Now, when the last day of vacation approaches, Sam reminds me that this day to get ice cream is coming up - and now, I hope, it means the day is a little less about the end of vacation and a little more about getting an ice cream together. 

This year, there’s a little more anxiety than in years past. Sam's going to an entirely new setting for school this next year. For the last five years, he's gone to a school about 15 minutes away from home. This year, he's starting a special needs program in a college that's about 40 minutes away from home. So, along with the new setting, it’s a longer ride. It's stressful for him being so far away from home, and I hope he doesn't know it, but it's stressful for me knowing he’s so much further away, too.

But last night, we had our ice cream, and Helaina came along. 

At bedtime, we reminisced about the summer, all the while, I cast my line to see if he needed to talk about the next day. But it seemed to be best to take it easy, and so bedtime stayed as relaxing as I could make it.

This morning, I stayed around to get Sam some breakfast and to wait with him and make sure there were no problems with the bus. When Sam woke up, he looked pretty disheveled. His anxiety was obvious, just by looking at him. When I asked him how he slept, he said he slept "just fine," which is pretty much what I would expect him to say - no matter how untrue it was. But you could see it in the tightness of his face and in the focus of his eyes. And you could see it in his mussed up hair, and you could see it in his posture -- how he sat on the edge of his seat as he ate, and later, with his jacket and cap on, an hour early, how he sat at the very edge of the couch cushion while we waited for the bus.

I calmly went over the plan for the day, all the while, doing my best impression of not being stressed out myself. Sam sat on the couch and did the same. I hope I was doing a better job of fooling him than he was of fooling me.

The bus company was supposed to have called a couple of days ahead of time to let us know the details of what the transportation situation was. But the call never came in the days leading up. And it never came this morning either. So we waited together for a bus that ultimately never showed up. 

But that was okay because we had a plan. And the plan was that we would sit together and wait. And if the bus wasn’t there ten minutes before I thought we should leave, then we would gather up and wait that last ten minutes in the car together. And if the bus still didn't come, even after that ten minutes, then I would drive him to school. No problem.

So we waited and it never came. But like I said, no problem.

We drove down to the college, keeping the chit chat to a minimum. I told him that, after dropping him off, I would call the school about the bus and get it straightened out, and that even if they said they would pick him up, I would come down to the school anyway - just to be sure.

When we got to the college, I walked him up to where one of the instructors met us. I filled in the teacher about the bus situation and, before leaving, I watched as Sam walked along the side of the building and disappeared into the school.

On the way to work, I called the school and left a message about the bus situation. About an hour later, I got a call from his instructor, letting me know that the bus company called and that they would be picking him up after lunch. She said she told Sam that she would call me and let me know that I didn’t need to bother to come. I let her know that I would be there anyway - watching from a distance, just to make sure.

So, around lunchtime, I left work and made the ninety minute drive back down to the school, where I waited in the distance. After several minutes, I saw Sam and his teacher come out, and look around for the bus that wasn’t there. I watched as they went up some steps to another lot, apparently looking to see if the bus was waiting up there by mistake. So I started to move my car - and then I saw them come back down again. Sam looked over in my direction and then he waved. My cover was blown. 

He recognized me - or rather, as he told me later, he recognized my license plate number- which I guess is good because I don’t even know my license plate number, and should I ever need to know it, I now know who to ask.

I went over and stood with Sam and his teacher, and we waited for the bus that was apparently lost in the maze of parking lots below. As we waited, Sam told me the day, “Wasn’t too bad!”, which, as I may have mentioned previously, is a pretty big compliment. In this case, it wasn’t so much the words themselves, but rather, it was how they were said. You could hear, not only the pleasant surprise in the sound of his voice, but most especially, you could feel his relief. For the most part, at least for now, the stress was gone. And knowing that his stress was gone, meant that, at least for now, it lifted from me as well.

The bus eventually showed up and before he climbed in, I told Sam that I would follow him home. And it surprised me because he thanked me- and it was so simple, but it was so heartfelt.

It was as if I were doing this, just for him.

Sunday Dinner

Sam and I cooked zucchini on the grill today. Actually, I did the cooking but Sam did most of the prep work. He diced the garlic - which he's getting pretty good at, and he sliced up the zucchini for me as well. I added the herbs, somewhat per his suggestion. It was a variation on  the concoction we use when we grill mushrooms.

I'm not big on vegetables , so I hedged my bets and also cooked some hamburgers, hotdogs, kielbasa, some chicken and a couple of other things that I found shoved in the freezer. Oh, and some corn on the cob - thirteen ears worth.

I saved cooking the zucchini for last. And since it took me pretty much all afternoon to cook everything else, Sam started eating and was done eating by the time I finished cooking it. So, I let it cool while I packaged up all of the other stuff, which I then had to wedge into the refrigerator. This took some doing.

By the time I managed to cram everything into the refrigerator, the zucchini was cool, so I took a few slices and put them in a bowl and put the bowl in front of Sam. He stared at it for a minute, and I think, had I asked, he would have come up with an excuse as to why he couldn't eat it. But I didn't ask. I just acted like it was a given that he would want some - and since he helped make it, I think he felt he was obligated.

Finally, he took a tentative bite. And then another. And then he polished them off. "That actually wasn't so bad" he said. I think he was more surprised than I was.

I hadn't counted on this. I half expected that he would hate it and I would have to dump it into the compost pile. But now, it looked like I was going to have somehow fit this into the refrigerator as well.

Another Video Clip

I find myself watching this repeatedly...