When I was a kid, I always looked forward to the county fair. I loved the horse shows and the sleek, fat calves with the rubbery pink lips and the cages of fancy rabbits. I liked the sparkling jars of crisp, green pickles, the cakes and pies and cookies and all the fancy needlework. To me, it all seemed ”Best of Show” and everything deserved a blue ribbon.
But what I loved most was the carnival. I loved the booming calliope, the shrieks, the beautiful, mythical merry-go-round animals, the sheer boisterousness of it all. I was fascinated by the people who ran the carnival. Young or old, they were gritty, world-weary cynics, unfailingly rude and unapologetically seamy.
I loved the spinning, whirling, jerking, spit-up-your-cotton-candy rides, the games that never gave up the mammoth stuffed animals hanging all over the tent, and the urgency of the barkers pacing with their megaphones in front of the sideshows: STEP right up ladies and gentlemen. GET your tickets now. The show`s about to start and we`re about sold out. SEE the smallest man in the world. SEE the man who grows watermelons from his chest. SEE the fat lady covered head to toe with tattoos. SEE the geek bite the heads off live chickens.
When you`re only 9, what could be more compelling than the opportunity to see someone bite the heads off live chickens? I was accustomed to seeing my grandmother at the chopping block with the poor unfortunates destined to be dinner, but who could bite their heads off? Yuk.
I wasn`t sure what tattoos were, but obviously they were naughty and should have my full attention. And a man who grew watermelons from his chest? It must be heaven.
The problem, of course, was finding an adult to take me in. Obviously, my parents were out of the question, and my sister`s boyfriend flatly refused, correctly envisioning a sideshow of his own: See the World`s Angriest Father Punish Boyfriend For Taking Innocent Child to see Creepy Sideshow.
As it turned out, I had to wait until I was 14 and had a boyfriend of my own before I got to see the magic wonders of the sideshow. I was disappointed that the man who grew watermelons from his chest was no longer among the cast, leaving me to wonder if the rigors of his profession had finally gotten the best of him, or if perhaps it was just a poor crop year.
Other lesser attractions failed to live up to their billing-the half man/ half animal was an old man with sad eyes and out-of-control testosterone, and the scariest thing about the snake handler`s snakes was the about-to-crumble cardboard box they slithered in.
But I was enormously pleased with the tattooed fat lady who still remains the best demonstration of poetry in motion I`ve ever seen. She was an undulating 300 pounds of animated comic book action, a living billboard, the original performance artist.
I still regret having seen the man who bit the heads off live chickens. I tried to avoid it by looking elsewhere, but attraction to the macabre is strong, and I watched in spite of myself. It made me sick and it made me cry. Sick was easy to understand, but I didn`t expect the tears.
I`ve often wondered since about the people who made up the sideshow attractions. At the time it made me sad because I thought I was face to face with a total loss of human dignity. Maybe so, but maybe there lurked among them a cosmic jokester, or those who seized an enterprising bridge between survival and homelessness.
But carnival sideshows are no longer part of the wholesome family image that county and state fairs now project. I realized that recently when I went to a county fair one night with friends.
We saw perfectly groomed riders warming up the beautiful gaited horses before the horse show, and we saw the perfectly groomed fat calves and pigs, and rows and rows of fancy rabbits. We rode the spinning, whirling, jerking spit-up-your-cotton-candy rides, but the people who took our tickets, fastened us in our seats and offered their best wishes were well-scrubbed teenagers, very polite and dressed by L.L. Bean.
The only people who barked at us wanted to guess our weight, and there wasn`t a tattooed fat lady or a live chicken anywhere in sight. It was seamless.
