ON A STICK

It's State Fair time! Having dinner with my Parents tonight, we started telling stories about all my childhood adventures at the fair each summer. The fair is where I discovered food on a stick. There really ought to be more of those. Everything just tastes better on a stick. Chances are it's fried and that may help.

It is where I had my first no-parents-rowdy-teenagers-only afternoon. I still remember how free and spirited I felt (it was 1992 perhaps I was just high on Pepsi, Birkenstocks with socks and Gn'R). There was my best friend (coincidentally also a Jessica, but she had fabulous curly hair and a waaaay cooler last name), and a smattering of our friends from smart-kid-summer-school, including the boy I had a crush on. Oh Aron with only one A, you were cute. He was taking Shakespeare and I French, then as luck would have it we all found ourselves in art class. Sigh. I know Jessica and I spent more time writing notes than drawing pictures but no matter, I went to art school for college and made up for a few lazy summer afternoons. I digress - sorry. The afternoon was nearly the site of my very first kiss and then the doors on the haunted water ride flew open throwing us into the sunshine and obviously the moment passed. I am pretty sure we went for something on a stick shortly there after.

There were the years of High School where we went every summer before school began and showed off our tans and caught up outside the confines of a school hall. We discussed who hooked up with who over the summer, who had the worst summer job, was that haircut really a good idea and how we had survived yet another family vacation. All this was accomplished of course over something on a stick.

Then there was the summer I became fascinated by the cow giving birth. Yes me, the child who passed out at the sight of blood or worms (being eaten, not the kind on the side walk after the rain. I saved those). This event came well before the fair became a social hunting ground, back when I still loved the fair for the animals, county crafts, silly photos and the hours walking around with Mom eating something on a stick. But, back to the cow birthing tent. Anyone who's ever been on a farm knows the birthing of animals is a slow, sweaty, down right nasty process. At 7 years old, me, not so much.

After our sawdust filled tour of the baby chickens, goats, piglets (more on them later) we came to the large animals (I am still not sure who thought the pigs weren't large. They looked mighty big to me). There she was, pacing back and forth, occasionally letting out a cow sized groan in the birthing pen. I drug Mom up into the noisy metal bleachers believing I was in for a nice little show. Pretty soon I was fidgeting and driving Mom crazy. "Can we go?" said Mom. "Yes, if you promise we can come back for the baby part." I bargained. Off we went back to the aisles of something on a stick.

Periodically I tugged Mom back to the cow tent to check on the progression of the heifer. Eventually (no really, it was well after dark by now), things looked like they were getting good. Excitedly I perched on the bleachers once again. This is about when the trouble began. Was it me or was it getting warmer in that tent? "Something shot out of the end of that cow!" I pointed and squirmed. Mom nodded. The something was not the kind that comes on a stick - just so we're clear. I stared disbelieving. Where was the baby cow? What was all that - whoa! More stuff came shooting out and landed in the hay. Mom stared to smile. I started to go green. "Um, Mom, I think I want to go." She looked over at me and shook her head. It was pretty pretty pointless to argue, I had been dragging her back here for the last 5 hours.

When the feet started to poke out it got better. Then the nose showed up and the farmer climbed into the pen and took 2 fingers and cleared out the nostrils. It was rather cool to see it sniffing away in there. Then things really got going. A few big pushes, the cow finally laid down and - BABY COW!! Finally. Mom started licking, the cow mom not mine and the little cow made some cool baby noises. Soon thereafter both were standing, the baby on wet wobbly legs. I squealed. Mom laughed.

Then I noticed the mom cow was pushing the hay around and chewing. "Hey, what's she eating?" Suddenly she lifted her head and whatever had come shooting out of the business end of the cow, was now hanging from her jaw. The cow was perfectly content to chew, re-chew and chew on it some more. That was it. I flew out of that tent like my ass was on fire. I could hear Mom inside howling from laughter. There I stood under the stars, in the summer nighttime heat, at the fair, totally disgusted and for once not wanting something on a stick.

20 years later I still love going to the fair but I avoid the baby animals. And actually it is not because of the cow, but because I can't stand the crack of the newborn pigs getting their baby teeth clipped. Ack.