On the road.....again.....

We didn't stay 'home' long...Tim was antsy and soon found a local carnival for us to travel with for the season (roughly April through October). I wasn't looking forward to this, having just found out that I was pregnant, but Tim had grand plans of making loads of cash. Once again, we gave up a semi-secure home base for the pie-in-the-sky plans of getting rich.

Tim had the gift for talking people into things (obviously!), so he did make a great carnival game operator. He ran the lucrative balloon dart game, and I was placed in the basketball game. Not being one to talk people into things against their will, I wasn't very good at talking people into continuing to lose money for the elusive 'big prize!' The game wasn't impossible to win, just difficult, and those skilled enough to shoot the ball still had to go through various stages, from winning a small prize, trading that in for a medium one, and so on, until they would actually win the 'big one.' The carny name for the biggest stuffed animals is "spoofer," because it kind of spoofs people into playing 'just one more time.'

Our living quarters were built in behind the games. These were designed for the couples, and were a little nicer than bunk-house type of trailer that the single people were assigned to sleep in. We got paid nightly (a third of what we brought in, minus the cost of the prizes that were given out that night), then would have money to buy food with for the next day or so. After really good money-making nights, my husband and I would spring for a much-wanted motel room. Unfortunately, some of the carnies lived day-to-day, eating a little and drinking or buying drugs with the rest of their daily pay. There was guy named Don who was called "McDumpster Don," because he would dig food out of fast food garbage bins and heat his findings up in a crock pot, leaving money for his beer every night.

The carnies we worked and traveled with were interesting people--some did it because they were raised in the carnival and it was the business they knew; some were running or hiding from something; still others were just kind of lost people. In the carnival there was a code of protecting their own, and it was oddly comforting...I sometimes wish Christians would hold to that code as strongly as my carny friends did. There's a carny phrase that you yell out if someone is trying to rob you, hurt you, or generally cause trouble: "Hey Rube!" When the guys heard that, they would jump into action, defending their own.

There were several guys who were sort of the leaders of our rag-tag group, and my husband rubbed them the wrong way, first because he had kind of a bossy, arrogant, and rude way about him, and second, because of how he treated me, often leaving me to fend for myself even as my pregnancy progressed and flirting with girls to get them to play his game. They were protective of me, though, like the big brothers I had always wanted; they gave me the nickname 'Princess,' helped me set up my game when we reached a new town, taught me how to run some of the carnival rides when there weren't any crowds, and even threw a baby shower for me! They often asked what in the world I was doing out on the road, why I was with Tim, etc. They could see the big picture better than I could!

I learned a lot about people as the carnival traveled around Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri. To quote the title of an old Depeche Mode song, "people are people!" In every town, people were very similar. There were kind people, judgmental people, and very, very lost people. It would make me sad to watch young ladies hang around the carnies, just looking for some male attention, and it would devastate me to see those same girls straggling away from the carnival trailers early in the morning, used and ignored once again.

There were two times I was most insulted during my time as a carny. Once we were set up in Oklahoma at a dog track grand opening. It was a quarter of a mile from the nearest place to eat, a gas station with a sit-in snack shop area, and none of us had cars (we all had to drive the carnival suburbans and trucks from town to town). I was probably about six months pregnant, hot, tired, hungry, and thirsty, so I did my best to keep up with everyone. A couple of the guys with us had their shirts off, and as we walked into the gas station the clerk told us we couldn't come in because of the 'no shirt' policy. After exchanging some words, she allowed those of us with shirts to come in, so the others waited outside while we bought their food and drinks too. While the guys waited, they observed another customer come in shirtless, make his purchase, and leave with no hassle. When asked about the double-standard, the clerk told us that the other customer was just purchasing something and leaving right away, and she could tell we were coming in to sit down and eat. Hmmmmm!

The other time, we were set up at a small town somewhere in Kansas, and the local police came to the carnival looking for ME! They wanted to question me in connection with some local robberies!! When I asked them why I was being questioned, they said I fit the description of the suspect. I asked if that included blond and pregnant?! My husband assured the police that we were in our trailer all of the previous night, they asked a few questions, then left after telling me they'd be watching me and further investigating.

Some people just saw 'a carny,' not a person, and made all kinds of judgments. These experiences were aggravating, but they helped me learn to see each person as an individual, not a type, color, occupation, etc. "The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7