Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Fresh faces of tomorrow

Julie Carter

Where did they all come from? Dozens of new, (to me) young, fresh faces with big smiles, easy laughter and energy without end.

The county fair has been in forward motion all week starting with the arrival of the kids and their animals for the junior livestock shows. Squealing pigs, bleating lambs and goats, crowing roosters and the sounds of laughing children fill the barns as the activity of the annual event moves in a blur through each day.

This beehive of activity from daylight until well past sundown is accented with the faces of families. Everywhere there are babies in strollers and toddlers exploring their freedom to be able to wander to the ring fence, under the bleachers or to the nearby goat pens to point and touch the animals inside.

Tweens and teens in groups can be found everywhere practicing their social skills of looking cool and the age-old art of looking but pretending not to look at the opposite sex.

Grandmas and grandpas, aunts, uncles and cousins line the bleachers cheering on their favorite show contestant. Businessmen, teachers, doctors, lawyers, judges and young adults who have moved beyond their county fair days all drop by to inhale a dose of show ring ambience and visit with people they sometimes see only at the fair each year.

Like Christmas, the county fair comes every year, and like Christmas, in brings different gifts to each one involved.

For me, it's the delight in watching people, mostly the kids. I love the dynamics of county fair families - from the diehard, dedicated competition-driven to the timid first-timers who seem a little overwhelmed but are eager to become a long-term part of something that highlights the last month of summer every year.

For every bit of sadness there is in not seeing those "favorite kids" that became the cream of the crop in the show ring after 9-10 years of showing before they went off to college, there is a renewed energy that comes in watching the first-year kids so full of hope and enthusiasm.

This year there seems to be an influx of faces I haven't seen around the fairgrounds before. And I love it. New "fair moms" and dads line the show ring, stand in the wings dressed in the usual style of fair families - rubber boots, wet jeans from time on the wash rack and hands full of brushes, rags, a spray bottle, a bucket and the occasional lead strap or bottle of fly spray.

The indoctrination process to reach full-fledged fair parent status takes only one day. The day their child is to show his or her animal.

Today's fresh faces of the fair are tomorrow's hope. Raised on values involving, honesty, fairness, thoughtfulness for others and hard work before reward, these 9- and 10-year-olds experiencing their first fair will one day be managing the world. I'm very glad that behind them is a legion of hard-working people who are willing to volunteer hundreds of hours of their time to make this event happen.

Thank you families for being there. Thank you fair board and volunteers for making it the place to be in August.

See you at the fair.

Julie can be reached for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net.