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closeFrom the editor: Events mark the season’s changes
Heather Meier
The Spooners berry stand I pass every day on my way to The Herald will close soon, indicating to me that the seasons are beginning to change. Summer is slowly slipping away and fall is sneaking up on us. Working in the valley, I’ve learned to judge the changing of the seasons not by what’s growing outside but by community events.
From the closing of the region’s berry stands to the first day of school, Herald staff members try to get extra sleep in preparation for one of our busiest times of year — the combination of school, football, politics and The Fair. It’s an exhilarating time of year we refer to simply as Fair season.
Once school begins, I won’t see my sports editor before dusk on any given Friday because of the football schedule. There is no denying this is a football community, but with numerous fall sports at the seven high schools that also need to be covered, Shaun Scott has his hands full.
Puyallup reporter Chris Albert and Sumner reporter Roxanne Cooke will be busy switching back and forth between back to school activities and election coverage. And photographer Colleen Carroll will have to be ready to go whichever way the wind blows.
On top of that are 17 days of scone eating, pig watching and dizzy pass-using fun at The Fair. In my opinion, it’s not truly fall until you go to The Fair. The combination of the smell of scones and horse manure is the clear indication that it’s fall.
The awkward time between Fair Season and holiday season is filled with Halloween, a holiday that is too far away from September to be part of the fall rush but not close enough to the turkey holidays for inclusion there either. Sumner starts this holiday off with the Scarecrow Contest and only a few weeks later the downtown Sumner and Puyallup streets are packed with trick-or-treating kids.
The Old Cannery’s annual bridge lighting each November means it must be the holiday season. It sneaks up on me every year and I attend the community celebration kicking myself once again for not doing my Christmas shopping earlier. But it’s hard to be too disappointed while sipping hot chocolate and singing carols. Communities twinkle with tree lighting festivities and the Santa parade winds its way through the street.
Once Christmas and New Year’s have come and gone, The Herald goes into hibernation and recovers from all of the excitement of the earlier few months. We continue covering school events, council meetings and anything else that comes up, but we enjoy the chance to catch out breath.
It’s not a long wait, though, until Daffodil season. In truth, the Daffodil Festival starts back in the fall with the selection of princesses from each school, but it’s not until January and February that the young women attend their training.
The Daffodil parade and all of the beautifully decorated floats draws in the spring. On the heels of the parade is The Spring Fair, a smaller version of its fall relative. The parade and Fair bring the valley back to life after a gloomy and typically wet winter. It also begins another busy time in East Pierce County — Meeker Days, the opening of the Farmers’ Market, eight high school graduations, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and the culmination of senior projects.
And then we’re back into summer, with Bonney Lake Days, the Sumner Arts Festival, movies in the parks, outdoor concerts and the valley’s berry stands.
It think it’s a nice way to tell time around here.