To start off my Sunday morning, I took Toby for a brisk walk around the ranch house park before I even cracked open my first can of Zevia Cola.

I did my best to wear out Toby’s little brain during our walk by having him sit, stay, and do little tricks for treats when there were no other dogs around. He did everything I asked him to do eagerly, knowing I'd give him a piece of chicken each time he obeyed. 

The one time we encountered another dog on our walk, I made Toby sit and lay down quietly in the grass while the other dog (an old black lab with a grey snout) plodded by. Toby really wanted to scream at the other dog, but behaved anyway knowing I’d give him a chunk of chicken if he stayed quiet. As soon as the black lab and his owner were out of sight, I gave Toby a huge chunk of boiled chicken and continued on our way. 

I worked with Toby until I figured he was sufficiently worn out enough to behave at home while I went to the Cherry Creek Arts Festival with my grandparents. I didn’t plan to be gone all day, but I still wanted to give Toby some attention before I left the house so he (hopefully) wouldn’t get upset and chew something up while I was gone. 

For years, my grandparents had been wanting to visit the Cherry Creek Arts Festival, but always had other plans while the festival was going on. However, when I asked my grandparents if they wanted to go to the festival with me, they excitedly agreed and decided to skip church that Sunday to go with me on the coolest day of the month. We planned to rendezvous at a Target on Arapahoe Road and I-25, so we could drive together to the arts festival and back.

I wasn’t excited about the driving part, but I was determined to do it as part of my exposure therapy to highway driving, city driving, and scariest of all, parking garage parking. On top of that, to attend the actual arts festival, I’d have to face my fear of crowds and not get overly stressed when I’m standing shoulder-to-shoulder with strangers. If I could tolerate all of those things at once and still have lots of fun, then an entire city would open up for me. 

Plus, I wanted some inspiration for my own art. I’ve been strongly considering selling my own art to the public, and hoped to find some encouragement and motivation to do so at one of the best art festivals in the country. 

At around 8:30 AM, I began to make my way east towards my Target destination, blasting Creed Fisher and Luke Kaufman as I drove with the windows rolled down, breathing in the crisp, cool air. Whether or not I felt it, I had to feign confidence and excitement to stave off the fear and doubt that were trying to get me to turn my truck around towards home. 

My grandparents arrived at Target at exactly the same time I did. We parked side-by-side towards the back of the parking lot, and I got out to exchange hugs and discuss plans. Once we agreed on where to park, my grandpa took shotgun while my grandma agreed to be our backseat driver. 

“Are you excited? I can’t wait to see it!” grandma piped up from the back as I turned left out of the parking lot. 

“Yeah.” I nodded, “I’ve never been to this art festival before, but I reckon it’ll be great!”

“I don’t know if you looked at the website very much, but I spent a good hour last night perusing it… there are over 250 juried artists to see at the festival. Isn’t that something?” grandma asked with a smile. 

“I intentionally decided not to look at the website…” I trailed off as I focused on merging onto I-25 amid a lot of traffic, “I wanted the art to be a surprise.”

“That makes sense!” grandma smiled, “I won’t spoil it for ya then.”

“You did a good job getting on the highway, by the way.” my grandpa commented, “You are getting more comfortable behind the wheel, aren’t ya?”

“Yup.” I nodded, keeping a close eye on the BMW that was needlessly tailgating me in the center-right lane. 

I was so focused on driving that I didn’t pay an ounce of attention to my grandparents as they talked to each other. I watched for my exit like a hawk while speeding drivers aggressively passed me from all sides. But, as soon as I got off I-25 and waited for traffic to pass before I turned right onto University Boulevard, I felt my shoulders relax and my attention returning to my grandparents. 

“You see that police station right there?” my grandpa asked as he pointed to a building to my left. 

“Uh huh,” I nodded without taking my eyes off the road. 

“One night about- oh, forty-somethin’ years ago, a random lady got into my car at a stoplight and asked me to take her home. I asked her where home was and she gave me an address. Wanting to be kind, I drove her to that address as she passed out across my backseat. When I got to the house, I shook her awake and told her she was home. She looked around and mumbled, ‘This ain’t my house…’, so I drove her to that police station right there and helped the cop carry her into the station. When she realized that she was being taken to the drunk tank, she turned around and shouted, ‘You little pothead!’ at me. The cop and I just burst out laughing!”

“Uh huh…” I nodded again as the stoplight turned green. 

“Another time, at the church just down this road, I helped build a bench for the bus stop. It’s not there anymore, but I had a lot of fun utilizing my construction skills to build that bench.”

“Uh huh…” I nodded one more time as I came to a stop at yet another stoplight. As focused as I was on driving, I still enjoyed listening to my grandpa relay his stories to me.  

“I’ve so many fond memories from this city, Maya,” my grandpa continued, “I’m happy that you’re getting out-and-about more and taking the initiative to make memories of your own down here.”

“I still prefer the country life, though…” I sighed as I drove past historic homes shaded by century-old maple trees that looked just like the ones on the farm in Minnesota.

“Well, the country life is certainly peaceful,” my grandpa began, “But, as you know, it isn’t perfect. The weather is brutal and the work is constant, hard, and dangerous. The danger aspect of farming was part of what motivated me to go to college and move west. Plus, there was just so much more opportunity here in Denver than there was back home… If you play your cards right, you can live in the best of both worlds.”

“How so?” I asked as I noticed the Cherry Creek Whole Foods on the horizon and to my right. 

“Well…” my grandpa cleared his throat, “You can have a house in town and a place to retreat to, kind of like what my buddy Eddy’s got. He lives in the suburbs but can go to his cabin whenever he wants. That- at least in my eyes- is ideal, would you agree?”

“Sure.” I shrugged as I prepared to turn right onto Clayton street, “I’ve gotta focus a bit here. Looks like I’m gonna have to flip a u-ie at the next stoplight to get to that parking lot.”

“Yup!” my grandma chimed in, “That’s exactly what you do next.”

Amazingly, I got a green arrow almost as soon as I stopped at the light, allowing me to turn around without worrying about traffic. Then, I turned into the Whole Foods parking lot, when my grandpa said, “I bet if you bought a drink from here, you could justify taking a parking space towards the back.”

“You think?” I wondered just as I noticed a sign that read, “NO EVENT PARKING.”

“Oh yeah,” my grandpa nodded. 

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I shook my head as I noticed two cops parked at the edge of the Whole Foods lot next to a tow truck. One of the cops gave me a disapproving look as I circled past them, “I’m just gonna go to the parking garage.”

“Good idea!” my grandma agreed. 

“Better safe than sorry, I guess…” my grandpa chuckled. 

I could feel my heart begin to race again as I approached the entrance to the parking garage. I cringed a bit as I drove under the clearance bar, half-expecting to hit it with my Xterra’s rooftop storage compartment, and stopped behind the Tesla ahead of me to switch out my sunglasses for my regular glasses so I could see where I was going. Finally, as I approached the kiosk to pay for parking, I reached for my wallet but my grandpa stopped me. 

“Here, let me pay for it.” he said as he handed me his credit card. 

“You sure?” I asked as I pulled up as close to the kiosk as I could. 

“Of course!”

“Ok. Cool.”

I slid my grandpa’s credit card into the kiosk, then drove ahead when the gate lifted open for us. Surprisingly, not a lot of parking spaces were taken over (yet), so I found a perfect spot on the second floor, just steps away from the stairwell. 

Outside, the sun was out but it was still relatively cool. Herds of people were moving north from Cherry Creek Mall, following the sound of modern rock music emanating from the next street over from us. I made sure the coast was clear before rushing across the street with my grandparents in tow. It was just after 10:00 AM, and the festival was already busy. But, I went to the festival knowing it would be busy, so I felt relatively comfortable, albeit still a little hesitant, when joining the fray. 

Immediately, I was drawn to a booth adorned with colorful paintings of people. One painting in particular depicted two women in summer dresses, looking at paintings being displayed at an art festival. In fact, it looked like the artist painted that painting while people-watching people at the Cherry Creek Arts Festival. The painting itself cost a whopping $14,500 dollars, and it wasn’t even the most expensive one on display in that booth. 

But, I wasn’t shopping for art. I was looking for inspiration for my own art. And I noted that artist’s colorful style as I braced myself to rejoin the crowd of festival-goers and move onto the next booth. I decided to take some advice from the painting I’d just viewed and people-watch as I waited for my grandparents to finish perusing the booth themselves. 

Most of the festival-goers were old; older than my grandparents, even. Naturally, the crowd moved very slowly and wasn’t as raucous as most festival crowds often were, making it easier for me to immerse myself in the art and enjoy myself. But, I also wasn’t exactly comfortable. I could almost see my social battery draining like my Xterra’s gas tank in the mountains as I stood at the first booth at the art festival, so I craned my neck to glance around for booths that drew in my interest, then B-lined it to the next booth that did just that. 

While I stared at paintings of landscapes clearly inspired by midwestern farmlands, I noticed that while my grandma Connie was standing beside me, my grandpa was nowhere to be found. 

“Where’s grandpa?” I asked her. 

“Oh, he’s probably in the booth behind us talking to the artist.” my grandma answered, “Whenever we go to museums or festivals like these, we usually go our separate ways to do our own things. Grandpa likes to stop and chat, while I just like to look.”

“Ah, makes sense.” I smiled as I went back to studying a painting of an abandoned barn on an endless prairie. 

As I made my way to the outside of that booth, still staring intensely at that artist’s paintings of fields and farms, someone tapped me on the shoulder, startling me. I spun around as a lady asked, “Would you mind taking a picture of us? He just bought one of my biggest paintings!”

Behind the artist was a huge painting of some naked Picasso-style figures in questionable poses, to put it lightly. 

“Uhhh… sure.” I nodded as the lady left me with her phone to pose for the camera in front of her painting with the man who bought it. 

Being the nice person I was, I took several shots and handed the phone back to her. As nice as she was, I didn’t really like her art style, or the mostly-naked figures her paintings portrayed. That said, there’s no denying that she was a very skilled artist and people liked her work enough to fork over thousands of dollars for it. Just because I didn’t find it appealing didn’t mean it was “bad art”. So, I ended up complementing the artist on her use of color theory and went on my way, while she helped her customer cover the painting in bubble wrap.