There was a time, years ago, when I first treked off to the Folk Life Festival…my roommate, Dena, told me about it, and at the time it was wonderful because it was free and we were poor and in college. I have to admit, in the span of one afternoon she and I danced barefoot in three seperate drum circles. We ate the cheapest food we could find, but splurged on strawberry shortcake. I bought a cd from a steel drum band called the Toucans, one of the songs was later used in several dance pieces I choreograped for Origami Girl Productions. Anyway, my life moved forward and became busier. Memorial Day weekend would roll around and I would be out of the city, engrossed with school, or later, living in Colorado.
I knew it would be hard to muster up the strength to head out to the Folk Life festival this year, knew it even before Josh and I found ourselves lying around the house on Monday afternoon. After all, the days of going to the Seattle Center for the sole purpose of being ‘noticed,’ to be swept up in a crowd, to appear young and carefree are pretty much over. Gone is my long, stringy, hippie hair from my early twenties and my embossed leather Birkenstocks were thrown out years ago. But, like going to my Saturday morning ballet class or jogging around the block, I knew that once I made myself do it I would be very happy I did.
Classic pictures of the International Fountain (you can’t escape the Seattle Center without snapping at least a few):

So, no drum circles this time…I wasn’t wearing the right shoes and it was super soggy so I couldn’t go barefoot. We ate a ton of classic fair-type food…except chicken skewers. While surveying the menu, this woman got in my face and said, “I’m in line, just so you know!” I said, “OK” and we could have left it at that except she kept going, “I mean you just sort of swooped in there.” So I said, “I’m outta here” and left without getting a skewer. She had a very un-earthy, peace-lovin, attitude that super bummed me out. Luckily, I shook it off and enjoyed the rest of the afternoon.