Fairground - All the Fun of the Fair

 

‘Grease’ was on TV again the other day. I caught the end of it when I switched on for something else and enjoyed singing and dancing with the end-of-school carnival.  The feel-good factor is excellent, the ‘happy ever after’ is perfect and that last five minutes at the fairground made me feel uplifted.  It rates highly amongst my favourite films of all time. I’ve seen it so many times, I know it word for word, song for song and never tire of it. The DVD must be everlasting.

The Pleasure Beach was on my doorstep but out of bounds to me when I was growing up. It made no sense to me at all because when I was twelve I was told to take my five year old sister to the nearby amusement arcade to ride on the waltzers upstairs. We were based on Central Promenade during that summer and it was far busier than South Shore. We went to the waltzers and the slot machines lots of times. Well, some rules are there to be broken and there was nothing wrong with the Pleasure Beach, as far as I could tell. My friends and I, beat-night skaters, would cut through to reach the Ice Drome and back again. Sometimes we would linger. I couldn’t relax. I was keeping watch for anyone working there who might recognise me from our pub, or know my dad. At home, I was told that dodgy characters frequented the Pleasure Beach, including some of the people who worked there. It didn’t deter me. They might have had a fit if they’d known how many times my best friend and I had talked ourselves into free rides on the Grand National. This was in the days long before wristbands or tokens and people could just go in and walk around for free.

This is David Essex, talking about his younger days working at fairs, which set him in good stead for his character, Jim Maclaine in ‘That’ll be the Day’,

“I’d actually worked on the Dodgems, I worked on the Whip, and what interested me about fairs – and still does – is that kind of scary-but-good atmosphere. There’s a menace there, there’s a danger in the fairground, in the midst of all the whiteness and coloured lights and amusements. Just around the corner is this underlying violence.”

I love ‘there’s a menace there’. Maybe that is what the warnings were about. I wasn’t aware of dubious characters on the Pleasure Beach. A couple of the ride attendants were lads I knew from school, on summer jobs. Nothing menacing about them. No David Essex before he was famous, as far as I noticed – I would have noticed.

Many years later, on a family holiday to Butlins, our daughter wanted to go on an Astroswirl, or something similar. She was about eight and didn’t like rides, but she fancied this one. I backed off and so did her brother, so left with no choice, my husband took her on. Then the screams started.

“Get me off! Get me off now! Stop! Daddy make it stop!”

The whole of Skegness, beyond Butlin’s must have heard her. The ride was halted. They got off and the other people had a longer second turn. Everyone was looking, except me and my son. We were just looking at each other as we wandered off, totally disconnected from the situation.  

I’m just wondering if I could fit ‘Grease’ in before tea time?

I found this poem by Scott Martin, a writer from an area of Scotland I know so well.

A Ballad for the Funfair

A Ballad for the Funfair,
A Seaside town,
The Soldier and his lover,
Lost at sea and their
Final meeting, wherever that may be,
At the End of the World.

Some like Roll-a-Penny
And some prefer the stalls,
Whilst others are mad for the Waltzers
Or flick the silver balls.
But you and me, my love
We were a Roller-Coaster ride:
Our ups and downs, our highs and lows
Were always side by side.

Under an electric star, inside the car
Our sweat glued us, like fear.
You gripped me tight in close delight
Breath pounding in my ear.
Excitement as real as the spinning wheel
And the crudely - painted rides,
Behind the facade of manic - laughter,
Where only sorrow hides.

You saw me once, when you were young
In a dream, standing alone
In some god - forsaken valley,
Battered and scarred by War; false hope
Tattered by reality - like the ragged flags
Hanging listless in the violent breeze,
Washed up, like our dreams
On some sad shore, as it will be
At our final meeting, at the End of the World,
Whenever that may be, with the Sun,
Blood-red and no time for tears
For we have wept an ocean these past years
You and I,my love, so long ago now
Since you sighted land, far away, and you waited
For the tide to turn, but the light faded and died
Over the horizon, as it did
When we stood, together, on a cliff - top
Lashed by the rain of a faded seaside town
Seeing the Carnival lights through the blue - Diesel haze,
The big wheel turning, in it's orbit, like the planets.
Time, standing still for a moment, in the tinny night.
The sad laughter hushed the screams -
Silence, poised, for an eternity of bliss
On the pinnacle of delight.

Scott Martin

Thanks for reading, stay safe, Pam x