Life as a Clown

Life is strange.

The eccentricities of my life and past are so familiar to me that they have mostly stopped being surprising. I don't even bother to tell people, because on some level I assume that they know. But life keeps moving on, and I keep meeting new people who don't know my stories. And one day I look up and I discover that even my very close friends don't know things about me that are pretty basic, just because it has never come up.

I worked for several years as a professional clown. I haven't done it in a full-time way for a few years, but there was a time when that was my job. I made enough money to pay for a trip to Mexico. I made enough to pay for my first year of university.

When I was in high school, my older brother got a job as a clown on the street. He was hired by a florist to stand in a clown costume, wave at traffic and draw attention to their store. He had applied for a job as a cashier, but they were hiring for a clown, and since he knew how to juggle he thought it might be fun. He was miserable. I used to go visit him every day to keep him company. I would ride my bicycle down to his work with my roller blades in my back pack, and then he would ride my bike home, towing me on my roller blades. It was fun.

I was there almost every day, and the owner of the florist got to know me, and when my brother left for university, she offered me the job instead. I couldn't juggle, or do anything clown-like. What the heck. I thought. I don't NEED the money, so if I hate it I will quit and it won't matter.

I spent eight hours a day, five days a week that summer practicing my juggling. By the end of the summer, I was very good. I could juggle balls, clubs, rings, knives and torches. I could do tricks like under the leg, behind the back. I could juggle one handed, I could eat an apple while juggling it. I was very good.

My parents bought me a unicycle for my birthday, and I taught myself to ride it. I made myself a pair of stilts, I taught myself to make balloon animals, and I started to get bored with interacting only with traffic.

And somehow people started to get my phone number. I never advertised, but I would get phone calls asking me to do parties or special events. I had a blast. I spent months developing my propless clowning, until I was fairly sure I could spend a few hours happily walking around a party without any juggling balls or balloons and could still be funny and fun. I practiced storytelling, and developed a few clown skits.

I don't do much clowning anymore, but I would like to. Maybe I'll try to get a busking license this summer, and see what I can do.