Murderous Clowns and Other Circus-based Fears

by Kaya

I simply will not tolerate a belittling clown. You heard me. I won’t stand for it.

Clowns are inherently creepy. While my fear of clowns may seem irrational, don’t you find it scary that they have an emotion painted on their face? Don’t paint on a smiling face or a frowny face – just smile or frown. What are they hiding? I just know those clowns are waiting to stab me or at least taunt me if I let my guard down for a second. You can see it in their eyes...just below the wildly painted eyebrows.

If you don’t think clowns are frightening, check out serial killer John Wayne Gacy’s self-portrait. Really touching clown work.

The last clown performance I witnessed involved a mean-spirited clown. I would think being mean-spirited would get you kicked out of clown college or at least demoted to mime. The clown made people dance then laughed at them. He even pretended to vomit when a heavy-set woman danced. He was horrible and I found myself fantasizing about punching that exaggerated smile off of his face...or at least washing it off with some warm water and soap.

I was somewhat surprised at my outrage, but in reflection it’s pretty clear – I like my clowns either silly or murderous. At least you know what you’re getting. I simply will not tolerate a belittling clown.

My other circus-based fear is of balloons. I recognize that nothing spells a party like balloons, but every one of those stretched globes is just waiting to pop. It’s the nature of a balloon to pop. By definition a balloon is stretched almost to it’s limits with an extremely thin layer of rubber preventing it from exploding. It’s hardly an irrational fear. I don’t blame the balloon, I blame the balloon blower-upper.

As you can see, I’m a real hoot at the circus. I suppose the question of why would I go to the circus begs to be asked. Why subject yourself to murderous clowns and explosive balloons? Quite frankly, I love cotton candy. It’s one of life’s miracles. Sure, they say it’s just sugar and air – it’s no big deal. Look, I have sugar and I certainly have air in my house...but I don’t see any cotton candy magically forming.

Little pink miracles, they are. And no balloon-wielding clown is going to keep me away from these treats.