Midways and Highways

Arriving in the Phoenix area, we found where the carnival was set up...at a flea market. The ever-promised state fair was yet again, not happening for awhile, and this carnival was set up at the flea market just to make ends meet in the mean time. We joined in, me assisting my husband as he ran their balloon dart game. It wasn't a good place for carnival games to be set up, kind of in a retirement/RV park area, so the owners decided to shut down at the flea market. Tim and I moved on from Phoenix within a week or two.

We began going town to town, using the aforementioned Amusement Business newpaper/magazine as our guide. We finally hooked up with a smaller carnival and worked at a few reservations with them. Tim worked in a balloon dart game and I worked in the cotton candy wagon. Wow, what a hot, sticky job, but I digress......

Being on reservations was a new experience for me, and it was very eye-opening. We met a lot of nice, hospitable people--the most memorable being when we first tried to meet up with the carnival. We were asking around in a restaurant about the carnival coming to town and found out they weren't arriving until the following day. As we sat down for a small supper, a nice couple sitting next to us struck up a good conversation. The husband was a Native American artist, and he invited us over to their home to see his paintings. They were incredible! So many times I've wished I could remember his name so I could find some of his artwork. We asked about local motels, but they insisted we stay in their extra room.

Other experiences weren't so good, and it really made me see the ill-effects of alcoholism more closely than I ever had. As soon as the midway would close for the night, we would quickly ride to our sleeping quarters as the police were breaking up fights, arresting people, etc. Once, as we got off work, we couldn't find our motorcycle. A drunk guy nearby heard us ranting about it and told us he saw some guys pushing it down a hill, pointing off in the distance. We went to a police car to report it, but they were dealing with a man who had just been stabbed, so we had three other guys we worked with come with us to track it down. Just down the hill, we could see a few guys trying to push-start it, yelled at them, and they ran off. We recovered the motorcycle, but it was sort of banged up and never ran quite right after that.

The nightly dangers got to be a bit much for us, so we left that carnival and found another that was very small, run by a nice married couple. They soon decided to park for the winter, however, so after my husband did some odd jobs for them, it was time to leave once again. We then spent some time in the Laughlin, Nevada area, living off of change that people left in slot machines or trades my husband made with some of our few possessions, eating cheap buffets, and sleeping in a tent. I can't express how disorienting this life was, piled on top of the things that already had shaken me to my foundation. While I remember details, like the Native American artist we met and the motorcycle being stolen, I mostly just remember feeling like I was lost in a blurry haze.