Expectations

Expectations

By Melissa Werle
Woodstock Union High School, Grade 10

It was the same old, same old at the fair. Carnival rides that looked like they were about to break any second, trash already strewn over the ground though the fair had just barely come to town. Greasy, sweet- smelling fried dough stands at every corner, mixed in with countless other fast food stands piled on top of each other. Con artists promising goodies to the gullible people falling for their rip- off games, and flashing, multi- colored lights that would make a person dizzy in seconds. I sighed. Of course. Every year I imagined a great crowd, shining new and fun rides, and a great deal of entertainment, only to be met by this sorry sight. Now I remembered how it really was. Why could I never commit to memory that the fair was always a disappointment that never met my expectations? I was two steps and five minutes into the fair, and already I was ready to leave.

My two friends and I spent an absurd amount of money on tickets for the rides and I tried to act excited as we climbed onto the first ride, which looked like a sideways hamster wheel and whose purpose was to make people dizzy and sick. On the ride, we saw another group of our friends, and decided that we would stay together for the night. We all agreed that we would go on a few more rides before getting our fill of fair food for the night.

As we climbed off the last ride, another stomach and nerve scrambler, I could feel my stomach growling, but I wasn’t looking forward to eating the food that the fair had to offer. We bought a couple of slices of greasy pizza and were still hungry when we saw a pickle stand. It was a strange little booth to have squished in- between the fried dough, cotton candy and ice cream stalls, but a couple of my friends and I decided that we wanted to buy one of these pickles, claiming it was because we wanted “healthy” fair food. We were served by a man who was almost as greasy as the pizza we had eaten earlier, but he scooped out the largest pickle in the barrel for me and my friends to eat. My friend went to take a bite of the strangely soft pickle. As he bit into it, the pickle made an otherworldly squelching noise that probably could have been heard by people on the other side of the fair. All of us starting laughing hysterically, and the general mood of our group lightened considerably. As the night went on, we went on many more rides, which didn’t seem as bad as they had before, and laughed over and over about our squishy pickle. By the end of the night, there was a carefree atmosphere that allowed us to have a lot of fun laughing and joking together. The night had gone way higher than my expectations.

Coming to the fair with such low anticipations, I managed to have a great time with the simplest form of entertainment. Just being with people who were fun to be around lightened up the whole fair- going experience, and caused my night to go above and beyond my expectations.