”Our Sole Intent is all for Your Delight”

 

THOUGHTS

As my mother and grandmother did,

I watch the crowds from my caravan, go

streaming to the fair. Clad in their bright

dresses, I see that all the girls have curly hair, or

hair that waves. The men are smart and clean,

erect and proud, with money jingling in their

suits, while children hold their candy floss like

fairy food, or gay balloons sail in the air above

them like magic words, following their holders,

bobbing as they bob, or sailing smoothly with

older hands to guide them.

 

I see young people laughing on the Caterpillar,

or holding tightly to the Noah’s Ark, or swirling

with the Waltzer, while I remember their

parents and their grandparents soaring to giddy

heights on the Yachts, or riding on the Scenic –

that golden, glittering Scenic with Waterfall of

many hues – real water.

 

And then I think of those sad, tragic years

when men were on the scrap heap. That bad

depression, when precious coppers were for

food – to fill the aching belly. When miners

squatted on the curb and watched the mad

gyrations of roundabouts beckoning them to

momentary happiness. And yet, with wonder, I

saw their children come to spend their pence,

while grim faced, lean ribbed fathers laughed

just watching them.

 

by Eleanor Green (during the late 50’s whilst travelling to familiar grounds in Glasgow, Hartlepoole, Keighley etc.)

The Green Family are famous showfolk who have travelled amusements since the nineteenth Century.

 

 Pictures copyright EAI Picture Library – All Rights Reserved