At the Parrot.
Saturday night of Fantasy Fest week.
Brought food (delicata squash stuffed with andouille spicy rice, topped with a little bruschetta, toasty pecans, and parmesan; sweet pickled beets and peppercorns on the side) to a beautiful friend who's working a double, right in the thick of the crowds and parade.
Sat here at the back bar with the same friend and watched parts of the bodyart contest, which basically consisted of a buncha old white dudes taking photos of women's tits.
My beautiful friend told me how she has watched Fantasy Fest evolve, over the past 8 years or so, from an artsy, costume-float-frivolity-focused occasion into an event populated by middle-aged swingers lookin to see some tits and maybe, maybe get lucky with someone besides their own wives. While empathizing about the pathetic debauchery that is rapidly coming to signify the Key West Experience, it occurred to me that this same progression seems to happen to every place or event that is able to bill itself as some sort of bastion of freedom. ...Freedom, I say. Not that All-American crap that tries to fit in Freedom's underpants.
Maybe too many people found out about Fantasy Fest.
Too many people whose lives are otherwise totally constrictive.
Too many people craving an anonymous outlet for their Not So Deviant deviant behavior.
Too many people desperate to shake loose the Manacles of Propriety that they themselves helped fashion.
...................
It's pretty disheartening and more than a little disturbing.
...Y'know, the more I think about it.
....................
So, which is the next poor town or festival to fall prey to Ustians' flight from their own Puritanism? How will these (Our) towns and festivals pay for the privelege of being centers of openmindedness?
Will we pay with legal sanctions on/against our festivities?
Will we pay with our vibrant, living communities' eventual conformity to our country's mediocre standards?
Will we trade our neighborhoods and small businesses for the Big Box's cunning conveniences and contaminated comforts?
Will we pay, in effect, with the same qualities that made our towns and celebrations such wonderful destinations in the first place?
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