Note: This story brings back many memories of my growing up... Please let me know what you think.
I had graduated high school a couple of months earlier. I was eighteen years old and it was August. In a month I'd be attending college in California. But, as I had done since my Dad had died several years ago, I would fly to Columbus, Ohio and visit my grandmother for a month in the summer. Grandma had a sister that lived up north. My great-aunt Ruth. My great-uncle drove down and picked us up to stay with them for a week. I always looked forward to it because they lived in the country and raised animals and grew their own vegetables.
The week we visited was the start of the county fair. We all got into his Ford Galaxy. I still remember the long bench seats and how big it was. Seat belts? This was 1966.
We drove through the dusty parking lot and rode the tractor pulled trailers to the main gate. It was early yet, so we walked around the commercial booths and garden exhibits. By lunch, it was time for them to get seated in the grandstands for the afternoon of horse racing. I enjoyed the first couple of races, but told them I'd like to walk around the fair. They told me not to spend all of my money on the first day and to meet them back at the grandstands by 4pm.
A county fair has a certain smell. The mixture of dust, fried food, hay and manure. It was summer in Ohio, so it was hot and humid. I played some games and remember throwing a ring around the neck of a bottle of Pepsi. They popped open a bottle of Pepsi and handed it to me and I sipped at the bottle as I walked. Never mind it was warm.
I went back to the livestock exhibits and walked out a side exit. The path out to the main walkway was bordered by a big tent on my left and the cinder block wall of the livestock building on my right. Inside the tent I could hear girls giggling. I peaked in at one of the eyelets where the seams of the side panels were roped together to form the tent wall and couldn't believe my eye. Inside was the changing room for the stage shows. This show was for the local college marching band.