Palisades Amusement Park (previously posted but it’s a favorite of mine)

Skip the bother and skip the fuss,

take a public service bus.

Public service sure is great;

it takes you right up to the gate.

Growing up in New Jersey, I heard that jingle played continuously on the radio during the summer. The commercial promoted Palisades Amusement Park as a fun destination for rides and entertainment. One Saturday, my friend Jay and I decided to visit the amusement park. It was located adjacent to the Hudson River in Fort Lee, New Jersey. We boarded a bus from Maplewood bound for Irvington. From Irvington, we transferred at Newark for a bus that deposited us twelve-year olds a few blocks from the amusement park’s front gate (just like the jingle promised.)

After walking past rides that we knew would make us throw up, Jay and I stumbled upon a sign advertising a side show. Following the sign, we traipsed down a weed-strewn path that led to a forlorn part of the park. Soon we came upon a large, weathered tent. Over the canvas tent’s entrance, a faded sign oddly proclaimed, “Exotic Transport.” Below the sign, an elderly man sat on a small chair dozing in the sun's warmth. Next to him, a mascara-eyed girl, barely older than us, hawked tickets.

“Step inside!" she called. “See the only sideshow in the park! Incredible sights and sounds! Don’t miss wonders gathered from around the world! For fifty cents, you get fifty dollars’ worth of thrills!”

Shyly, we each paid fifty cents. Pushing the front tent flap aside, we walked gingerly into the darkness. Once inside, I stood adjusting my eyes to the diminished light. The first exhibit featured an enormous woman sitting in a chair on a platform. She was outfitted in the fashion of a harem girl. I stared at her. When she stared back, I turned away.

On the next platform, a scrawny-armed, bare-chested, pot-bellied man was lifting a heavy-looking barbell. We quickly walked past him to view a couple of card-playing midgets sitting at a folding table that held a stuffed crocodile and a bowl marked “Brains.”

Finally, we arrived at the last platform. From behind a tattered, purple curtain, a middle-aged woman strolled out. Dressed in a rhinestone-glittering, black leotard, she had the longest legs I’d ever seen. She flipped on a record player and began tap-dancing to a scratchy jazz tune. Her dancing was lively and her smile captivating. After about five minutes, she lifted the needle from the record player and backed off stage behind the curtain. I continued to stare, mesmerized.

“The show is over,” the mascara-eyed girl told us in a now soft, girlish voice.

Throughout the week I could not stop thinking about the decadent allure of that shabbiest of sideshows marketed as exotic transport. The following Saturday, I took the long bus trips by myself. When I arrived at where the tent had stood, only some old pieces of newspaper and a few discarded snow cone holders flitted about the now empty concrete pad.

I guess joining the side show was not possible.