Life is Like a Festival in May

What kind of stuff is life made of?

We breathe, our hearts beat, and we assume we are alive. Of course we are alive! See how we walk and talk, eat and sleep, how we work and play, how we bury one generation even as we bring children into the world to be the next. Further, we weep, we laugh. On occasion we even sing for joy. All that is part of living. Surely, though, there is more.

Who can say what is in life to make it worth living?

Several weeks ago--the first Saturday in May, to be exact--the folks over in Coffee County held a Spring Festival, an all-day event in the town of New Brockton. Now here was an occasion to observe what some 2,000 people were thinking about life, at least on that given day in May.

The Coffee County Arts Alliance had arranged the annual event. Free. For the pleasure of the general public, and to call attention to the importance of all the arts and the crafts. It was held in the county’s Farm Center complex.

CCAA had invited artists and artisans, singers and all manner of musicians, writers, cooks, photographers, quilters and others nimble with a needle to come to the festival. Here, to exhibit and or sell the work of their hands, to compete for prizes, to perform, and to generally enjoy the day. And come they did!

The 98th Army Band was there to give a concert in the afternoon. The Enterprise High School singers performed. At high noon a guitarist offered his tunes to those who sat in the balcony cafe, munching down hot dogs and homemade sweets.

Contestants in the festival’s Literary Division had their previously judged manuscripts on display.

A group of boys stayed busy all day, grinding ice and making and selling snow cones. The popcorn machine attendants got little rest.

A candy-striped tent served as Peddlers’ Alley, a lively market place where church ladies came to sell baked goods and other persons came to make money on everything from pot plants and picture frames to rings, bracelets and bird houses. One ornate, stained glass bread box brought its creator $50.00.

Young photographers, equipped with studio furnishings and elaborate costumes of a bygone era, offered festival participants the chance to dress up like their forefathers and have their pictures “struck.” Scores did.

Many parents engaged one artist to do quick sketches of their children. Others took their youngsters to watch the various craftsmen fashion items on the spot.

Needlework enthusiasts made their way to the building where original handwork was displayed. They lingered to see a quilting demonstration in progress and to admire the array of treasured heirloom quilts and modern spreads and coverlets.

Down on the dirt floor of the Farm Center’s wide arena scores of professional artists displayed their paintings. Here also individual students and student groups exhibited their work.

It was in these hundreds of paintings--some exquisite, some fair to middling, some not so good--that any festival goer could find a myriad of answers to the question of what is important in life, what is beautiful, what is good to think upon.

Toward the end of the day it was easy to imagine one of the veteran artists saying, “Come look again at what we’ve put on canvas! Here are bits about life! See the dark clouds I used in this landscape. The clouds are driven by the wind. Life has its storms. But look here, in this seascape I show blue skies, and the water is serene. Only a slight breeze sweeps through the grass of the sand dunes. Life has its calm, sunlit times....

“And just look over there across the aisle at what Mr. So-and-So has done with a man rowing a canoe. What symmetry! Besides, he has captured there the idea that in this old world life is a stream, wide and deep, and every man must row his own boat....

“The judge gave the blue ribbon to those purple violets over there. See? And those onions, of all things, won a prize! Think what life would be like without flowers, and, onions!

“That eagle right there can make you want to fly away and be free, free, free! ... That tiger is sort of looking out at the world through a tangle of vines and leaves and tall grass. Sometimes it seems we all live in a wild jungle. ... Now you take that still life in the next booth. It is ...

The artist was interrupted by an announcement over the loudspeaker that it was almost five o’clock, time for all exhibitors to clear their booths.

In less than fifteen minutes everybody--the sponsors, the artists, the artisans, the peddlers, the ice boys, the cake ladies, everybody--had left. And a crew came in to set up a wrestling ring so that the regularly scheduled wrestling matches could be held that evening.

Well, the festival ended too soon. But then wrestling matches also mirror a side of life. The struggle.

Life is made of all kinds of stuff. As long as there is breath and the beat of the heart let us make the most of it all.

Life is like a festival in May.

THOTHS:

Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.

Published May 1978. Press your browser’s “Back” button to return.