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| Lunch with dad at the horse races. And a selfie! |
The Fair. I dread those words. I’m not a fair kind of girl. I mean, I like the exhibits and stuff, but the rest of it not so much . I can’t eat fair food, I don’t dare ride the rides, and the concerts are always overpriced and the free ones are ridiculously crowded. So every October, Fresnans go crazy that the fair is in town. The draw of deep fried Twinkies and the famous cinnamon rolls, the exhibits of everything “as seen on TV”, we even have Horse Racing. I rarely go crazy to the fair. Years ago I felt like it was a parent’s right of passage to take your kids to the fair. Then we took the kids to the fair and it exhausted us and the kids cried about everything. All the food they wanted but then didn’t touch. All the balloon animals that we bought for 100% mark up that popped before we got to the car. All the games we didn’t win. The fair always seemed like a good idea until it wasn’t such a good idea.
This year, the Hubbs and I figured we would let the fair pass us by. I had to work both weekends of the fair and the kids only had a mild interest. Then the third grade classes at my kid’s school decided to go to the fair. And since there is a second and third combo class, some of Caitlin’s friends got to go and came back with a full report. Awesome. For the remainder of last week all Caitlin could talk about was the fair.
The Hubbs said we should try to go. I didn’t want to go at night. And since he couldn’t leave work early on Friday I decided that he should take the girls on Saturday while I worked. Really? He was a little surprised. You won’t feel bad about not going?
Not. At. All.
And you know what? I didn’t. They left Saturday afternoon before I even left for work. I waited for the guilt to set in. While I put my make-up on. While I got dressed. While I drove to work. While I worked. I even sent him a text to send me pictures, and even when I got those pictures I didn’t feel an ounce of guilt. Most likely because I didn’t really want to go to the fair in the first place, but even when I don’t want to go places, at some point I get that “missing out” feeling. Not last Saturday.
I was really proud of myself.
I may not always feel that way about things the girls and the Hubbs get to do without me. I’m sure at some point there will be a weekend where I will have to work and they will get to do something fun. Nobody is perfect.
At the same time, I’m so glad that he took them. They had so much fun. They won some fish. They won some hilariously large plush doughnuts. They had lunch at the horse races. But they mostly had fun with each other. It’s something they will always remember. When they think about the fair later in life they will think about that time they went with Daddy and he spent our life savings trying to win fish and doughnuts bigger than their heads. They will think about the horse races and the horses and the huge cinnamon roll that Daddy brought home for dessert. And they will most likely forget that Mom had to work, and that mom really didn’t want to go anyway. Hopefully.
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| They won fish, that I predicted would be dead in a week. |
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| Everyone needs giant plush doughnuts. Right? |
The fair closed on Monday, and I silently thanked it for all the memories it created. Not just for The Hubbs and the girls, but for me as well. I didn’t have to go to the fair this year to really enjoy it. All I had to do was see the smiles on these faces.
