The circus

The girls and I went to Circus Chimera between rehearsals for their gymnastics show.

I don't like circuses. There it is.

I can admire the incredible skill and training and hard work that goes into a circus. I don't mean to slight the performers and staff.

But I think watching this thing took a year off my life.

I used to think I didn't like circuses because of the bright lights and noise and all the people, and because I felt the pressure of Past Expectations working against me. For my fifth birthday, my mother got tickets for us to go to the Ringling Brothers & Barnam and Bailey circus. I remember completely falling apart there - hating it so much and crying so hard that we had to leave early. Poor mom. The next item on our party agenda was a post-circus trip to Farrell's ice cream parlor - the kind of place where they make the birthday girl or boy stand on a table while a hoard of underpaid, acne-faced waiters and waitresses, armed with drums and whistles, rush the party in a manic parade, singing loudly and in what I, as a five year old, found to be a very threatening manner. By comparison, the circus was a sea of calm.

Poor mom. She tried to plan a few more birthday parties, but there was always something about being the center of attention at a party that literally destroyed me. I couldn't wait for the thing to be over. And so, I often didn't wait. I have vivid memories of ditching my own birthday celebration more than once when I was little. I understand now why I hated it so much. But that's another story.

And about this hating the circus? I think there are a couple of another, more real reasons I feel this way about the circus, reasons that came rushing loudly and clearly back to me as I sat, palms sweating, between the girls. It's two-parted. One part is that so much of many circuses consists of people risking their necks just to entertain us. I mean, these people could die. Yes, they had a few safety nets and harnesses and ropes, and yes, they've practiced this stuff incessantly. But still. When one daredevil asked the audience (from on top of a Wheel of Destiny) if he should do more feats of derring-do, while everyone clapped and cheered him on, I was sitting there thinking "No! No! Stop! Don't encourage him!"

The other reason I think I dislike the circus is the tension that the audience and performers emote. The air is thick with all the feelings, and (not that I'm some magical empath or anything), the emotions around me can be overwhelming.

But hey - we survived, and the clown in this particular show was good, and no one died. So I think my daughters' circus experiences are already better than mine were.

Breaking the cycle, again.