Tessie D

It’s Thursday, and only 2 days until Spring Break.

It’s the St. Patrick’s Day Festival this weekend. Every small town in Texas has some sort of festival — peach and melon festivals in August, a peanut festival in May. Ours is the St. Patrick’s Day Festival in March, the first weekend of spring break. 

Ours always starts with a parade on Saturday morning. The parade begins at the Dairy Queen. I play the trombone in the marching band, and we always go first, then the football players and the Drill Team. We march through town playing the school song over and over until we get to the Dr. Pepper plant.

Everyone acts like the festival is stupid and lame, but I enjoy it. The parade ain’t like what you’d see at Thanksgiving, with big floats or anything like that. We just decorate our trucks and trailers with green paper clovers and white and gold streamers. Some people ride their horses, and everyone throws candy at the kids on the sidewalk. Every street sign, telephone pole, and mailbox will be decorated with green and gold streamers and four-leaf clovers. 

There’s also an Irish stew cook-off, a pie bake-off, a livestock show, pig wrestling, a band, and the Miss Dublin beauty pageant.  It’s always packed, and the dress code is the four B’s: boots, boobs, bellies, and butts. But what everyone is most excited about is the carnival. They’ll drive into town tonight and start setting up tomorrow morning in the grassy field across from the city pool. By Friday night, the City Park will be packed with little kids running from ride to ride and teenagers holding hands on the Ferris Wheel.