Holy Days in the Apple Pi Inn: A Country Fair

How can you tell summer is coming to a close? The caravan of RVs arrive, the tents go up and the Wirt County Fair opens. Long hot hours of harvesting and haying, canning and quilting, grooming and growing are presented to public view and review. Not too big, not too small, just the right size for young and old and all the in-betweens. For old time’s sake and as a way of saying goodbye to my year in Almost Heaven, I pay my respects to the work of the handy people of Wirt. Their artful lives are set like a banquet on the rows of tables that line the old community building. The arrangement of tables hasn’t changed in over 40 years. The quilts always amaze; the glass jars evoke memories of canning green beans with my sisters on a wood stove. These 4-H projects make me proud of children I’ve never met. Once you leave the building there are hard choices to make: Tacos in a bag, pulled pork sandwiches, fresh squeezed lemonade, each booth with its own cause or mission or history. I settle on the Baptist Church funnel cakes with their taste of heaven. 

There are too many tempting smells for the calorie conscious so I head for the livestock barn knowing that the smell of the heifers, hogs, and lambs might lessen the temptation. After a long exposure of kids with frisky lambs and unhappy ewes, it’s time for the beef. 

I watch my great niece Baylee brave the ring for the first time, leading with her heifer “Awesome Moo”. Her Dad, Mom, Sister are holding on tight as she and Moo demonstrate how head, heart, hands, and health work together “to make the best better.” The judge circles, the Fair Princess tangles a blue ribbon, we hold our breath. We’re all waiting. Time seems suspended, like a drop of clover honey, then the sun sets, the ribbon is awarded, and the Ferris wheel lights come on. The best of a country summer comes to an end.