By PAT WICK

© Another Day in the Country

Don’t you just hate it when you want to remember something, word for word, and you don’t have a pencil and paper to write it all down? Doesn’t happen to you that often? All the time, for me.

This weekend I was in Salina enjoying the River Festival, sitting under a tent, listening to wonderful music, watching people, when suddenly a whole column for the Marion County Record began forming itself in my mind.

“Do you have a pen?” I whispered to my sister.

She shook her head and concentrated on the music.

How was I going to remember this? If I just had a pen, I could scribble a few key phrases on the edge of the program.

“Give it up, Pat,” I mumbled to myself.

It’s funny what triggers a writing odyssey. Sometimes, I hear something on the radio, while I’m driving — the only time I listen to the radio. Once again, I’m searching my purse, the front seat, the glove box, the dashboard, with one hand; driving with the other. I need a pen! “Write it on a sack, anything,” I say to myself. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

When it doesn’t work, I’m stuck trying to read my own writing-without-seeing scribbles: … personal … periphery? … What the heck is that word? And it’s a key word, too!”

Living in such a small Ramona-ish puddle, the Festival (any festival) is such a people-watching extravaganza. What a slice of humanity. It’s a mini-America with families, families, families everywhere sitting with their loved ones and their coolers in tight-knit circles under colorful rainbow umbrellas.

Perhaps I noticed it this year more because they’d organized the grounds into umbrella and anti-umbrella sections so that people who wanted to sit in the shade and talk were separate, somewhat, from the people who were willing to sit in the sun and see and listen to the fine music.

It seemed there were acres of shade-lovers, as far as my eye could see, like a shifting bright-colored kaleidoscope of rural Americana celebrating.

The musical entertainment was merely background noise to what was happening here under the umbrellas. As the day wore on, they didn’t move. They were content here away from Center Stage.

Camping is what it reminded me of — campers leaving the comfort of home to re-create their own little kingdom in a new environment.

Did these people come to watch the performances? I don’t think so.

Did they come for the music? Maybe, maybe not.

Did most of them come for a chance to buy some elegant, expensive art pieces at the Art Fair? Not.

They came, I believe, to experience community. Your kids, their kids, my kids, grandma, grandpa, auntie, mom all sitting around, stepping over the top of each other, waving, eating, drinking, laughing, talking, nodding off.

There was a couple sitting several rows in front of me at Stage II, older — which means I was guessing they were older than me. They sat under the tent, part of my community, listening to some fine Young Lovelies from Canada singing their hearts out.

She leaned over to tell him something. She has to get closer, these days, and speak louder in his ear, to communicate. He puts his arm around her, pulling her in, as she repeats herself.

I watch his gnarled hands tenderly pat her shoulder as she speaks. An extra little squeeze of affection and his well wrinkled face smiles. They listen on, leaning toward each other.

“Do you have a pen?” I ask my sister.

I want to remember this moment, these people, this glorious example of tenderness, old age, longevity, togetherness, community.

It was not my ear that was whispered into, this time, nor my shoulder that felt the familiar comforting pressure of a loving arm; but it was wonderful to see.

I remember how it felt and I’m grateful for their reminder that any kind word and any loving act is a gift to us all, on another day in the country.