Like, literally painted. Our town hosts a festival every spring complete with funnel cakes and face painting. I've been every single year since I was about 5, except for last year when I was living in Nashville. It's a typical southern small town festival filled with arts and crafts, civil war re-enactments and clogging. Did you people know that I used to be a clogger? Clogging is the southern version of tap dancing. Cloggers don't wear cute sequined tap dancing outfits though. Cloggers wear full southern regalia. I suppose this is because cloggers only perform at events that include said civil war re-enactments. You'll never see a clogger on, say, broadway.
I have no rhythm, however, and was kicked out of clogging. My mother attempted to put me in jazz after that but it was to no avail. I was kicked out of jazz as well. The cloggers perform on stage at the old train depot in the heart of downtown. I remember being little and wanting to get the clogging part over with so that I could roam around the booths of handmade doll clothes, eat funnel cakes and get my face painted. I remember that in middle and high school it became a social thing. You went and pretended that you thought cloggers and civil war re-enactments were lame and hoped the guy you liked would split that funnel cake with you. I remember still wanting to get my face painted but knowing it was no longer considered cool.
Now that I am older, I appreciate this sort of thing. This tradition that weaves itself through my history. This little small town festival that saw me transitioning clumsily through each of the phases of my life. That one day I might take my own children to and watch them walk in circles on construction paper squares all to win a homemade barch of brownies.
Today I'll go to the festival as a married woman. And I'll come home with my face painted.
