Originally published in emerge21: The Writer’s Studio Anthology by SFU Publishing, 2021.
It’s said we change careers an average of five times in our work lives. And to that I say: big whoop. Only five? Lousy vagabonds.
A small sampling of positions I’ve held: TV producer; Ice Cream Boy; Youth Pastor, Liquor Rep, Radio Reporter, Choo-Choo Train Driver, Language Teacher, Butcher, Touring Musician, and hawker of luggage, ham, and ladies’ shoes.
I’d be content to repeat any of these fine vocations—even the humbling ones, in order to weather these challenging economic times. Except one. A gig I hadn’t thought about in years, until recently, when triggered by a Cirque du Soleil billboard.
It sounded too good to be true. Twenty bucks an hour—for a university student in the 1990s— had the ring of a top hat salary. And just as my school expenses were mounting, my parents gave me the talk. It was time to start paying rent.
The hot job tip arrived during an acting class I was taking for my Drama Minor. Lesley was my sometime scene partner and, as she was ten years my senior, a bonafide woman of the world.
“A young guy like you can make a lot of money in drama, you know. I act almost every weekend.”
“Sure. Sign me up,” I said.
“I’ll tell my friend you’re interested.”
“What’s the part?” I asked.
“Clown.”
“It’s the part I was born to play.”
I spent the next week rehearsing with the new tools of the trade. The birthday business I signed with, run by a married pair of actors out of their spare bedroom, supplied me with a clown costume, makeup, and a bag of tricks which included long balloons, a plastic hand pump, and an instruction book from the 70s on how to twist rubber into animals.
I possessed very little balloon artistry. Our family cockapoo shivered with each squeak and cried at every pop, forcing me to practice in the shed. But I kept at it, an understudy devoted to the craft. My first successes were the latex trinity of wiener dog, giraffe (wiener dog with long neck), and sword (wiener dog missing two legs).
My costume was pretty much a child’s drawing of what a clown should look like: big red nose, big red wig, big red shoes. A technicolor jumpsuit. Makeup caked into triangle eyes, extra-large freckles, and an outstretched lipsticked smile. My dad, who previously questioned my drama studies, kept to his crossword as his son, the clown, left for his first day of work.
I never considered the mathematical reality; that earning twenty dollars an hour as a clown meant only working about three hours—three birthday parties—a weekend. Pocket money at best for punishing work. Factor in the prep time, gas money, and faking delight for every clocked minute, and the clown industry paid piss poorly.
My acting aspirations sagged upon every suburban doorstep as I rang parents’ doorbells, feeling as suspect as a grad date with a van. I was typically directed to a living room where a dozen little boys and girls sat cross-legged on carpet. The moms, dads, and neighbours, distanced in the kitchen with their small talk and beer, would glance at the party expecting to witness my merrymaking prowess. Instead, I’d be flop-sweating oil paint and running out of tricks by the eleventh minute.
Hand-pumping balloons and juggling foam balls were both dependable time-killers. But it was the face-painting that posed the true challenge. I had never touched a young child’s face (nor longed to), and knew very few of the characters the kids requested. A typical clown-child exchange:
“What face would you like, little girl? Cat? Dog? Mouse?”
“I want April from Teenage Mutant Turtles.”
“Mouse it is, kid.”
I eventually improved, massaged my timing, and gained more confidence in every stranger’s home. I started tapping into my inner clown with conviction; a Stanislavsky of the rec-room stage. But those were short lived halcyon days. It took only one slippery party for me to hang up my red shoes forever.
It was your typical birthday Saturday: a house call to a stylish home on an orderly cul-de-sac. Mom (the client) answered the door with a burst of perfume, then showed me to a basement full of six year-olds. A shit-ton of them.
“Okay kids,” Mom announced with a sweeping arm. “I give you…Mister Clown Man!” She foxed up the stairs and left me to my routine. It was business as usual.
At the tail end of the face-painting part of the program, Mom called down for me to take a break and settle up the bill. Upstairs, I sat at her kitchen table; mom in a white sundress and womanly makeup, me in rainbow overalls and clown makeup. Sarah McLachlan played from the living room.
“I’m Rhonda,” she said. “Glass of chardonnay, Mister Clown Man?”
“I’m good, thanks,” I said.
“Ah, come on,” she laughed, then flipped her blond mom hair. “Aren’t clowns supposed to be fun?”
Rhonda poured me a large goblet of white wine and refilled her own. I imagined every clown needed a drink to maintain his glee, so I accepted. She asked me a bit about my chosen profession and I answered in tight, nervous quips, mindful of my next party across town. Talking to me closely, her breath smelled of smoked oysters and Juicy Fruit. I noticed we both left identical red lip smudges on our stemware.
“Do something funny for me, Mister Clown,” she purred, then touched my hand.
“I’m good, thanks.” I smiled a thin smile.
“Come on. Clown around, Mister Clown Maaaan!” Rhonda said, and gave my knee a squeeze under the table.
My face paint morphed from happy clown to stunned pool boy. Arousal and fear tightened my neon suspenders ever so slightly.
Soon, Rhonda’s fingers fanned out on my knee. Then a slow tickle of plastic nails spidered up my leg. Our eyes locked. Her fingers climbed higher. My wig quivered. Then she went there: the ultimate party favour. The birthday grab bag. I shot up from the table like a balloon animal fleeing its pump, and rushed back down the basement stairs, clown shoes flopping in double-time.
Unsupervised for a spell, the birthday kids were now unhinged and completely undomesticated. They had smelled the gifts of freedom and ran around in packs, wild-eyed and rampant. The sight of me only provoked them.
“Clown! Clown! Clown!” they chanted in their high tiny voices. Rhonda stood at the top of the stairs, glass in one hand, giggling into the other.
“CLOWN! CLOWN! CLOWN!”
In no time, the children had me up against the wall, mauling me, poking me, jumping for my face. One kid threw a hot dog my way. Another snatched my red nose and danced around like it was his left boobie. I was trapped.
“CLOWNCLOWNCLOWN!” This time Rhonda joined the chant. How quickly she rebounded.
I’m not proud of what happened next. But it was the only thing I could do to escape, uninjured. I began to pinch every little arm I could reach. Hard. I pinched children with lightning speed. Boy girl, girl boy, didn’t matter. Hairless limbs jolted back in shock until I saw an opening in the (now-sobbing) swarm. I ran through it, up the stairs past Rhonda, and out the door to the safety of my rundown car.
I never did return to the Birthday Industry. I soon advanced to the less painful employment of summer roofing, at the very reasonable rate of seven dollars an hour.
Great story Jordan.