Mother of Clowns; 6 Months Later

I failed this year at my intention to keep up a proper blog. I was worse even than last season. There were drafts started and discarded, nothing actually made it to posting and now, here we are somehow, suddenly in April.

In exactly one week (nearly to the hour) I will be landing at JFK, back Stateside for another summer.

I had so many expectations of what would happen this season and how it would go. I had a plan, I had goals, it was all lined up down to finishing the season with a trip to India before I returned home.

I was meant to board that flight to Mumbai yesterday. Our season was extended and I made the choice to forgo the trip in order to stay. I couldn’t simply move my trip because I would now be spending May in Barcelona. A sentence I had only ever dreamed of being able to write is now my reality. India has now taken a backseat as my direction has changed.

My plans started to unravel even as the season began, by mid-November the life I thought I would be leading crumbled and I spent the next few months rebuilding what I wanted it to be, who I wanted to be. All of this while working as the general manager of the new circus at Global Village and acting as the mother of 12 circus performers, down to driving lessons, bathroom etiquette discussions, and sex talks.

So here we are 6+ months later. My Spanish has improved, I’m learning Russian, my Hindi is still terrible, I still can’t juggle, but I can walk about a meter on a practice tightrope without help. I can rebuild magic tricks, I have performed as a clown roaming the park and learned acrobatics in a pool and on a beach while being goaded by Latino clowns. I still refused to try the Wheel of Death, despite assurances that it’s perfectly safe.

I won’t be finding work in India. I can’t say the same for Spain. Or Buenos Aires. Or maybe through my computer without a city or permanent home.

As part of my rebuilding I plan to settle into this blog and get back to posting; putting less pressure on myself to keep things “professionally relevant”. As my profession keeps adapting and directions changing, my own growth is by default, relevant to my profession.

I have one more week of chaos and colors here in the desert. I have more grey hair than when I started, but also a bit more color to my world.

Xxx