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AMERICANA
The Unbearable Sadness of Craft Fairs
How many handthrown coffee mugs can one person own?
In response to my stern admonishments to myself that I have to get out of the house occasionally — why, I don’t know, but it seems like something “normal” people like to do — I’ve been going to a lot of craft fairs.
With mixed results.
Once you’ve seen a craft fair, you can’t stop seeing craft fairs. They suddenly pop up in your Facebook feed like brightly colored but poorly executed mushrooms, all exclamation points and three-man bands made up of CPA dads who always dreamed of being rock stars.
I don’t think I’ll ever hear a Simon & Garfunkel song again without smelling pulled pork.
Last weekend’s craft fair was five minutes from my house, so it had that going for it.
Everything was crammed into the tiny town square and the only thing I could afford was a tie-dyed T-shirt, a burnt hotdog to help fund the local historical society (always pass on the onions and relish that have been sitting out for hours in the hot summer air), and some wildly overpriced ice cream.
I didn’t see any handthrown mugs, which is for the best. The last handthrown mug…
