September marks the beginning of fall, the start of football season and the community celebration of Bonitafest.
Bonitafest kicks off this weekend at 6 p.m. Friday, Sept. 21, with the Twilight Trail Parade, continuing on Saturday, Sept. 22, with the Performing Arts Festival & Street Fair from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and ending with the Bonitafest Melodrama at 7:30 p.m. from Sept. 26 to 29.
Max Branscomb, general chairman of the event, said Bonitafest is an annual event for the community to come together.
“Bonitafest is a celebration of community where we try to give people a chance to assemble and see each other once a year,” Branscomb said.
The fifth annual Twilight Trail Parade begins at the Sunnyside Saddle Club Arena at Rohr Park on Sweetwater Road and ends at the Bonita Library on Bonita Road. Participants are encouraged to bring their horses, dogs, bicycles, wagons and glow sticks.
This year’s parade theme is Living Together in Peace. Branscomb said the theme was inspired by the parade’s grand marshal Ruth Goldschmiedov Sax, 90, for service to mankind and her message of peace. She will lead the Bonitafest Twilight Parade.
Goldschmiedova Sax is a holocaust survivor who has spent the last 70 years traveling around the country giving talks about the Holocaust, Nazis and religious persecution.
Branscomb said this year’s theme, Living Together in Peace, applied for Goldschmiedova Sax during the Holocaust that it can still resonate today.
“We’re struggling with (living in peace) in the United States, a little bit right now,” he said. “Mrs.Goldschmiedova Sax is such an inspiring example of the way to live your life right, to live your life in a meaningful way.”
Branscomb said the performing arts festival will also have a multicultural component that represents the Latino and Filipino art scene.
The final stage of Bonitafest is Branscomb’s long running Bonitafest Melodrama. This year’s production “Thin Skins and Hayseeds,” is a musical-comedy based on the 1916 Sweetwater Valley Flood with a touch of “Romeo and Juliet.” The Melodrama starts at 7:30 p.m. each evening at the Sweetwater Community Church Theater, 5305 Sweetwater Road.
