Until Saturday, I thought we had been enjoying a terrific stretch of Indian summer. We had balmy days with plenty of sunshine and just a hint of cooling in the evening and early morning. Many of our trees have begun to display their fall foliage, slowly turning colors for several weeks. Some years it seems we shut off the air conditioner during the same week that we click on the furnace. This fall has been terrific.
However, I must admit I went into curmudgeon mode mid-morning on Saturday when I stepped outside to venture off to the Scarecrow Festival downtown. Brrrrr… where in the world did that front come from? Never fails, does it? Someone tries to plan an event that would be made better by wonderful weather and Mother Nature bombs the whole kit-n-caboodle!
Well, the event took place without a smile from Mother Nature and did better than I expected when I first ventured outside.
The response to Scarecrow Festival planners’ pleas for participation was tremendous. What a great display of scarecrows representing humorous and educational themes, group and business displays, scary subjects, and plain old garden-variety scarecrows. I was impressed by the variety and skill demonstrated by many exhibitors. There were not nearly enough prizes, in my opinion.
I confess to being a bit embarrassed about not putting out a scarecrow of my own. It is not as if I don’t harangue my six regular readers and any others who might stumble across this opinion page to participate in whatever events are going on in the community. You folks should take me to task for not having a scarecrow character out in front of my house. Shame on me, I admit it.
I offer no excuse other than I am not clever about things like that and I just could not think of a scarecrow style with which I could identify. A conversation after the event with festival organizer Peggy Phillips assured me that I have a year to come up with something as she thinks we can do this event again. She has my vote and I will try to be a better participant in 2016. I cannot wait to see what you people come up with for a second celebration. Some of this year’s entries will be tough to top.
The festival was a nice little celebration for our community — hats off to those who developed it. Good luck for a second annual event and thanks to the many folks who got involved.
—SUSAN MARSHALL