The Labyrinth, The Lights, and The Otter That Got Away
It was November 1st, a day that felt less like the gloom of approaching winter and more like a crisp invitation to something electric. The air was chilly, the kind of cold that demands layers but leaves your face feeling awake. So, the family plus the inimitable David Morgan piled into the car and headed to the Coastal Carolina Fair.
There is something inherently hopeful about a county fair. You walk in, you get your wristband, and you surrender yourself to the idea that for the next six hours, the laws of physics are just suggestions, and sugar is a major food group.
We were a squad ready for action. Wyatt was sporting a t-shirt that declared "Born to be a ROCK STAR", which I suspect is not just a slogan but a prophecy. Lolo was alternating between her ghost-print shirt and a red "Amistad" hoodie, looking every bit the protagonist of her own coming-of-age novel. And there was David Morgan, bearded and stoic in red, ready to brave the mechanical contraptions designed to spin us until we couldn't remember which way was north.
We hit the lines, which were long, because of course they were. But lines are just pauses in the narrative where you get to hang out. We ate pizza. We ate peanuts. We laughed at things that probably weren't funny to anyone outside of our specific bubble. Lolo and Wyatt found the Magic Maze, a literal funhouse labyrinth, and ran through it over and over again. There is a metaphor there about life being a maze that you choose to run through because the disorientation is part of the fun, but I was too busy trying not to lose sight of them to fully formulate it.
Then, the sun went down.
If you have never seen a fairground at night, you are missing one of the great aesthetic spectacles of the modern age. The "Zipper" lit up in neon purple and pink, and the Ferris wheel cast a perfect, shimmering reflection onto the water below. The whole place glowed with that artificial, magical bioluminescence that only exists in carnivals.
And it was in this glow that we faced the tragedy of the evening.
Lolo saw it: A stuffed otter. It was large. It was majestic. It was arguably the size of Lolo herself. She wanted it with a desperate, singular focus. Now, I am an adult, and therefore I am burdened with the knowledge that carnival games are rigged. I told her this. I explained the economics of the midway. I explained that the hoop is too bouncy and the bottles are too heavy.
But hope is a thing with feathers or in this case, fur. She wanted to try. I capped our investment at twenty bucks.
Twenty bucks bought us six tries. We stood there, the tension thick in the air. She got close. She got extremely close. But "close" in a carnival game is just a synonym for "losing." Ultimately, we walked away otter-less. There were tears in her eyes, the heavy, wet tears of childhood disappointment.
To ease the sting of defeat, I bought her a bag of cotton candy labeled "The Monster Bag" that was roughly the same volume as her torso. We walked out under the carnival lights, sugar rushing through our veins, the bitterness of the loss still lingering just beneath the sweetness.
But as I looked at the photos later, Wyatt making heart hands, the smiles on the coaster, I realized that while we didn't get the otter, we got the story. And maybe, just maybe, a Lolo-sized otter will find its way under a tree this Christmas.
Because the thing about hope is, unlike the carnival game, it isn't rigged.