My First Time

Special thanks to Brittany for sharing this story of her first trip to a carnival 🙂

The first time that I went to a carnival was when I was eighteen years old. It would come to town usually once a year when I was growing up but my mom would never let me go because she always said it didn’t look safe enough. When I was in my freshman year of college though they had the state fair carnival in town and all my friends were going.

I was really excited because I felt like I had missed so much not going as a kid. I spent hours with my friends getting ready to go, none of them could believe I had never been before. Even though it was a carnival we still wanted to look our best. We went together, we all rode in my car and the guy I had a crush on went with us. We got there and parked and had to walk almost a mile from the parking field to where the rides and games were set up at.

The first thing I wanted to do was get cotton candy and a funnel cake. I will always remember how good that funnel cake was. We rode the Ferris wheel first and then played some of the games. My crush sat with me and then won me a stuffed flower at one of the game booths. We played the skeet shoot game for most of the night and even went bobbing for apples. The games were the best, you could tell they weren’t rigged or anything. I rode the bullet ride and got dizzy so I had to sit down for a while. Come to think of it maybe the funnel cake and cotton candy should have waited until last. I almost won a prize playing the strong man game where you hit the hammer against the base and try to ring the bell. I only missed it by two inches. I was disappointed but it was still on of my best memories having my friends beside me laughing and cheering me on. I like playing the booth where I bought three balls for a dollar and tried to knock over the bottles. I wasn’t very good at it but it was still a lot of fun. I really liked riding the tilt-a-whirl ride; it was fun but didn’t make me dizzy and didn’t go up to high since I am scared of heights.

I went back to the carnival several times after that over the next few years. Even though every time was with good friends and a lot of fun, no night could ever match up to that first carnival. I was afraid that it wouldn’t turn out to be as good as I thought it would be but it was even better. I had a great time and made some good memories. I still have the pictures from that night, and the stuffed flower. I will never forget the first time I went to a carnival and how much fun I had. I just can’t wait to see those same looks on my kids faces their first time.

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