So, instead, Jubilee Day commemorates the real religion of this country--commerce. Jubilee Day celebrates the real patriotic victory of our righteous nation--highly unfettered capitalism, at which we're number 1 [raise fist in air and whoop like a redneck].
But I'm not bitter . . . or judgmental . . .
I made use of some extra vacation time and the pleasant weather (blue skies, 70s F, low humidity--a rarity, I fear, for Pennsylvania in mid-June) by enjoying some of Jubilee Day's attractions.
Hmmm, but what are those attractions exactly?
Fine dining
Unfortunately, food wasn't one of 'em for me. All of it--crabcakes, roasted corn, barbecue, cheesesteaks, chicken corn soup, fried veggies, funnel cakes, and more--looked tasty and smelled greasy. Usually, these are my cues to indulge, but nothing appealed to me at the time. Yeah, like, I know! Shock!
For one thing, I was sorely disappointed about the lack of more traditional Pennsylvania fare on offer. There was, yes, chicken corn soup and cheesesteaks. But where were the chicken and waffles I'd seen advertised for weeks by one of the local churches? Where were the brats? The kraut? The salty and sweet pretzels? Good heavens, man, where were the whoopie pies?
For another, I was perturbed at the lack of fried-food-on-a-stick at Jubilee Day. Maybe this just isn't done north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Maybe the deep-fat-frying technology hasn't cleared customs at the border. Maybe they ran out of sticks. Whatever the reason, Pennsylvanians, with their love of sugar, pork, salt, bread, and fat (usually featured all together in one dish), seem like prime targets for the type of supersized fair food you find in North Carolina and Texas. After all, who can resist the siren wail of fried Snickers on a stick, fried Twinkies on a stick, and fried banana pudding and vanilla wafers on a stick?
Oh wait. That's an actual siren wailing. Somebody called 911. You're dying, you poor bastard.
However, I didn't overindulge. In fact, I didn't eat anything at all. For, you see, I've determined that the solution to not overindulging at town, county, and state fairs, and the like, is simply to overindulge at home before heading out the door. Usually a few handfuls of butterscotch chips and a half bag of slightly stale Martin's waffle barbecue potato chips are all one needs to surpress one's appetite. "No, no, I couldn't possibly have a funnel cake and a brat! I filled up on fat, sugar, and salt at home. Thanks all the same!"
I'm surprised that this diet regimen hasn't caught on. Maybe I have a book in me after all.
Fine art
Three words to live by when attending street fairs--including "the largest, one-day street fair on the East Coast," as Jubilee Day is billed:
"Juried craft show."
Accept nothing less, and you'll be less likely to suffer from the kind of aesthetic whiplash I experienced walking along Main and Market Streets today.
There wasn't anything as bad as the lime green, crocheted, hoop skirt-wearing Scarlet O'Hara dolls made out of Clorox jugs that I used to see for sale on the roadside in (where else?) North Carolina in the 1970s. Over the last few years, we may have had to endure the resurrection of hiphuggers and ponchos (we know who you are, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks, and we know where you live), but that's one craft crash-and-burn we've escaped the reintroduction of, so far.
Still, no one in Pennsyltucky should feel too proud of its artistic production. Bad art ain't just a Southern thang. No ma'am.
For ya got yer dumb t-shirts, tacky coffee mugs, ugly tea towels, ghastly crazy quilt combinations, and misconceived earthenware pottery designs in these here parts, too. Ya hear?
Fine company
But being visually terrorized by hideous "kountry kit(s)chen"-patterned toaster covers and Precious Moments memorabilia was only part of the cause for today's aesthetic whiplash.
This Commonwealth--at least this part of the Commonwealth--lacks, shall we say, a certain aesthetic panache among its populace.
Tattoes. Doo-rag-covered heads. All-over body tanning. Chain smoking. Ned Kelly-fashioned facial hair. Mismatched couples of "wide loads" and "narrow gauge railways" (if you catch my drift) and their cranky, full-diaper offspring. And all of them passing you by on their Harleys, which, next to the Volkswagen Jetta and the Mack truck, is the Keystone state vehicle.
Or worse, hogging the road with their strollers, which are truly the spitting, stubborn camels of this hemisphere.
*Oy.*I try, I try, I try never to be a snob. I mean, I'm from North Carolina, for land's sake, where former Nascar drivers insist on running for political office every couple of years. I spent nine years of my life in Texas, heaven knows, where the monster truck rally has replaced opera and ballet as a cultural highmark. I live in Central Pennsylvania, god hep me, where zoning and land-use policies are as rare and alien as ethnic diversity and cultural sensitivity at a Klan rally--or a country club.
In other words, I don't warrant a place on the too smug dais at the cultural geography bee. I tell you whut.
But let's do get real. I named this blog "Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered in Blogtucky" for a reason--and "bewitched" was a give-away, a freebie, just my being generous. Instead of "bewitched," I should have probably said "bedazzled," as in the "Bedazzler," that Ronco/Propeil-esque product that lets you literally draw a bead on your world, so that you walk around looking like a Cockney in a pearly suit. Sometimes it's just that flashy and trashy in these parts--but without the legitimacy of tradition and class of culture. There's a great deal that the area has going for it--hiking, restaurants, scenery, quaint towns and inexpensive housing, and even a decent amount of cultural opportunities for a city of this size.
But there are other times . . . .
So it's probably too much to ask that the borough government organize Queer Eye for Every Guy and Gal bus tours of Lower Manhattan for stylistic inspiration for the masses, giving each guest a FEMA disaster-preparedness debit card redeemable at any Garment District back door for cheap, famous label "stock overruns."
It's probably a bit OTT (yeah, you know me) to require that every resident of the Commonwealth attend a style reeducation camp presided over by Trinny and Susannah from BBC America's What Not to Wear.
And it's probably too "creative management" (not to mention socialistic) to ask that all workers in the region be given season tickets to the Harrisburg Symphony, free passes to the Susquehanna Art Museum, reduced admission to the Jewish, Palestinian, Asian, gay, whatever, film series at the Midtown Cinema, and/or free appreciation classes in the art of Kabuki theater or Russian opera just for the hell of it.
If I ruled the world, the trains would never run on time, but everyone would look marvelous.
But what a wonderful world it would be if we did indeed ask for these new social services--asked and received.
Glory, hallelujah, amen to that.
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