Harvest Festival 2010 Thoughts & Photos

We may have arrived too early — 11:15 am. Or maybe it’s because I wasn’t feeling too great this weekend. Anyway, something just didn’t seem right about Saturday’s annual Harvest Festival in West Richland.

If I had to put it in a single sentence: What’s the purpose?

Longer version: Why are we all showing up at Flat Top Park? What are we supposed to be celebrating? What are we supposed to be doing?

Don’t get me wrong: I think it’s great that West Richlanders can get together like this on a beautiful fall day and visit with neighbors. But it seems like such an odd mish-mash of things going on:

• The fire department is there showing off their equipment and letting kids sit in a real fire engine and get their pictures taken.
• Local businesses are there with booths selling their products and services.
• There are school-based singing and dancing groups putting on performances.
• At least one branch of the military had a booth, presumably to recruit new members? I’m not sure.
• There are games and contests, like sack races and such.
• There’s a big BBQ-style lunch area.

Again, not complaining. Just wondering where the “harvest” aspect is in all of this? Shouldn’t local farmers be there selling their crops and homemade goods? To me, a “harvest festival” is like a bigger, better farmers’ market-type of event. I don’t even know who organizes our Harvest Festival, but if they happen to find this, there’s my hope/request: little more focus on the “harvest” aspect of a Harvest Festival. Our other big city events — Hogs and Dogs, the Veteran’s Day Parade, etc., all have a very clear theme/focus. I think Harvest Festival needs one, too.

So now that I’ve shared my two cents, here are three pics that we took while we walked around Flat Top Park on Saturday. Had an interesting conversation with the Charter Cable reps, and I’ll write that up in a separate post.

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