I worked my first art festival at the '94 Fort Lauderdale Oktoberfest. Actually, it wasn't so much an art festival as a few arts and crafts booths scattered about the grounds of what was otherwise a testament to German beer (which I like), all kinds of wurst (which I like but don't trust) and the chicken dance (which I like unless I hear it 18,000 times over the course of two weekends).

The festival started one autumn Friday eve at six. I showed up at three, dragging a trunk full of supplies and beach umbrella to protect me from sun, rain and bratwurst. I found the woman in charge who said that if I wanted a booth, I should have applied months earlier. I told her that I had no booth, just an umbrella, and she wound up letting me set up next to a Peruvian couple who sold cheap jewelry and pipes.

My expertise lies somewhere betwixt art and craft. Using dog food and coffee cans, pot lids and pans, and a full spectrum of Krylon spray paint, in front of your very eyes, I turn sheets of poster paper into scenes of planets, stars, nebulae, comets and an occasional super nova--like the guy at Cocowalk, and Hollywood Beach, and Cancun, and probably a thousand other places. It's a performance art, the pictures taking form in five or 10 minutes, depending on size. I call mine cosmic landscapes.

That first festival went well. Over two weekends of fair weather, I grossed about $800. Subtracting my expenses: exhibition fee ($162.50), paint and poster paper ($10) and German beer ($80, more or less), I still managed to clear enough money to try this art festival thing again.

The Peruvians said that they were going to Palm Beach's Centennial festival next and would lend me their spare tent. Great. Once again the weather was fair, the crowds hefty and cosmic landscapes popular. I cut down on expenses by bringing a cooler with my own beer and cleared about $900 in one weekend.

I was really impressed. Here I was, a guy who can't draw a dog that doesn't look as much like a horse or cow as a dog, making wads of cash by painting. Here I was, a guy who normally shies away from the limelight standing before dozens at a time, performing five or 10 minute shows and bowing to applause as I scratched my nom-de-spray-paint, g.HARLAN, into the corner of my poster paper canvas and held yet another cosmic landscape up to the crowd.

I liked this art festival business. It sure as heck beat working. Except that this time, I had a tent to raise, wire dividers to set up, a gallery of pictures to hang, tables, chairs and, of course, the beer cooler. More stuff to lug around. And I had to awaken at dawn to get to the grounds to set up. That was a very workmanlike, too.

But once there, the other artists and craftsmen nodded in approval at me. From the Chinese water-colorist to the guy who made Mr. Potato Head-type sculptures out of coconuts, they all said I'd go a long way. And the papier-mache vegetable vendor proclaimed me a natural who could clear an easy 50 grand a year once I refined my booth and bumped my prices.

I got serious. Bought a used tent of my own, traded for a banner and worked for weeks to build up my stock, some of which I framed. More stuff to lug around. I used a connection to get into Fort Lauderdale's Promenade in the Park, one of the finest and best-attended art festivals around. An otherwise juried event, I gained admittance at the last minute for a bargain price as an exhibition artist and was told to set up anywhere where wafting clouds of spray paint wouldn't bother anyone.

I found a wonderful locale along an empty stretch between the funnel cake stand and the pig run, both of which attracted the kind of art connoisseurs who most appreciate my stuff. I was set to break all records, to have a $1,000 weekend. Nothing could stop me!

Except, maybe, a little rain. Friday night, it drizzled on and off. Business was slow. Saturday was a monsoon. Business stopped. The Promenade in the Park turned into The Promenade in the Lake. I serendipitously had set up on a little rise, which turned into an island by afternoon. And my new used tent leaked worse than a generic diaper. I never made it to Sunday.

My career as a professional vagabond artist was pretty sketchy after that. Truth is, it's not the kind of thing you can do halfway. Besides needing a reliable tent and assorted other gear, you need to plan ahead, researching and applying for festivals months in advance and always hoping that it doesn't rain.

With a wife and baby to support, I couldn't see having to depend on the weather to make money, or, for that matter, spending even clear weekends enveloped in clouds of Krylon paint. But I still performed where I could, a sunset art show on Miami Beach, a couple of church fairs or just out on the streets.

For a while, I went to the Hollywood Boardwalk and set up shop next to the bandstand. I made out all right until the cops started warning me, saying that I needed a kind of permit I wouldn't be able to get. Then, one night, I got a citation and it was bye-bye Hollywood.

Of course, I worked the Oktoberfest in following years, but it was never as good as the first one. I would have loved to have worked another Palm Beach Centennial Festival, but that one only comes around once every 100 years. I did work the Irish Festival, which was downright frigid. It didn't matter much. I was no longer looking to get rich. All I wanted was to paint a little, have some fun, maybe make a little money.

And so I did, though my tent broke its legs in the gale force winds. I haven't gone back to the festival life since then, though I hope to someday. There's a lot of work, and a fair measure of tedium. But when it's going well, there's nothing like working a festival, nothing like having a crowd of people watching you turn arts and crafts into a show. There's nothing like creating entire solar systems in minutes, in being the master of countless universes.

But the best part of a festival is the people, all kinds, wandering around in their own orbits. And in each passing face there is a universe of mystery and wonder that might just dock in your sphere for a spell and share a piece of human experience, which is really what art is all about.