Waiter, There's a Journalist In My Soup....Part 2

After having a journalist with me for three full days.  interviewing me.  And interviewing and interviewing.

I gained insight into who I am.  Or at least that I'm in the right line of work.  

Telling story and after story.  Telling my thoughts, my dreams, why I do what I do.  I realized most of the world does not think like me.  

Most of the time this makes me lonely.  

I truly think that what I do is the most normal thing in the world.  That auditioning for a commercial is just a normal activity for most people.  Knowing where to buy magic tricks, what's the best brand of whoopie cushion, why grease paint is better than water based make up, doing a video blog, wearing only underwear that has images of the Simpsons.

Is what everyone does.  

I think everyone wants to be famous.  I didn't know this wasn't true till yesterday.  

I also thought there was something wrong with me because I have a very hard time making a living.  Apparently, it's hard for all clowns.  There are very few people doing better than me.  Which is depressing and relieving.  

I do what I do because I have no choice.  Being a clown is the only thing I'm good at.  It's the only thing I know how to do.  

Finding that out is a relief.  

Excuse Me Waiter...There's a Reporter in My Soup...

The last 3 days, I had an embedded reporter with me all day each of the days.  

For three days, I did shows, he watched as I performed.  He watched, as my son came home from school and I said, "how was your day?"  I showed him how I put on make-up and collect money for my performances.  

I showed him my underwear drawer.  Why? Because I'm an idiot but I also am very proud of the fact that I will only wear Simpson boxers.  Yes, proud.  

I thought the article was about clowns.  I thought the article was about the world of clowns.  

The article is about me.  After a lot of interviews.  I didn't know that.  I slowly got it. There will be other people mentioned but I'm the feature of the thing.  What a strange feeling.  I feel so undeserving.  I also feel like of course it's me.  This feeling is a lot like being a clown.  As a clown you live in two worlds.  The lie that is clowning. Come on, I'm wearing a rubber nose a costume and make up.  

Yet, I really would love to be taken seriously.  

Two very different worlds. 

I'm processing what all this means, doesn't mean, how normal I am and how abnormal.  It's all come together in one long weekend. 

Being in conversation about my life and my "theories" of clowns, clowning wakes me to the view that I see the world in a way others don't.  

I honestly didn't know that.  

Every time I hear, "oh, I don't like clowns"  or "I'm afraid of clowns"  it's the first time.  It's like the first time.  

I realized I'm taken aback each and every time.  As much as I deal with this and talk about it.  It's new every time.  Weird.  

I also mess up my life, because I think everyone wants to be noticed and famous.  These two things drive my very being.  I only write this blog so that I am noticed.  In my head right now, there are thousands of people hanging on my words.  I wish this were just a joke but that's my feeling.  

I have a lot of work to do with a good friend from this weekend.  I forced the reporter on her.  She didn't want it.  That never ever occurred to me. I thought she'd love the attention.  She didn't and I'm a dick.  Yikes.  

Who knew.  

I do have a feeling today I'm in the right line of work.  It's something I question each day.  Finding out not everyone feels like I do is strange.  I'm a clown.  That's all I know.  That's what I do.  

Waitin for the news...

I'm about to have an embedded reporter follow me around for the weekend.  I'm so nervous/excited.

I've gone through all emotions this week since I found out.  (I've done a few phone interviews with him.  I was just taken aback when he asked if he could follow me around and watch my process as I put on make up and get ready.  What my office looks like, what my car looks like...)

I got the "I'm not worthy willies".  I was really mad at myself for a few days.  I got over it.  I feel pretty deserving today.

As I've been getting ready, I am going through my resume.  This crazy blog one of my biggest achievements.  Although, I take this as a huge failure.  It's a failure because I have so few readers.  Oh well.

It turns out, this cool reporter found me through this.

He even read it.  I have moments here where I am so frustrated with my life I want to quit.  The only place I share is, oh where the world can see it, here!  He saw it and asked me about it.

I've done a lot of interviews.  I was really close to being on a reality TV show about clowns.  I have come so close to fame.  I've never found it.

Maybe this time.

If I could do anything.  I'd have a children's TV show.  If I could do anything, I would do family shows in small theaters around the country.  Maybe someone will read this article and let me follow my dream.

Just a nudge beyond where I am right now.

Maybe this time.

Maybe this time. 

What's Life About Clowny?...

My year end reflection doesn't happen on December 31st.  I get to work a lot and my children are with me.

My year end reflection happens when I do my taxes.   Each expense has a story.  I buy a piece of music for a show, that makes me think.  I purchase a costume piece, get software for my computer.  Each event gave me such hope.  When I use my credit card, I'm living a dream.

This year was especially tough.  I did my one man show "Through The Eyes of a Clown".  It was my dream come true.  To stand on stage, raw, full of emotion, full of stories, making people laugh and cry.  What a creative dream.

I miss this show so much.  I started the show out of a challenge from my son.  Instead of doing my annual holiday show for kids. (Each year I rent a theatre and do public shows.  It's always an original theme.  It's expensive and gives me ulcers so I complain about it).

August 2013, my son told me to quit complaining and do a show for myself.  I had always talked about doing an adult themed clown show.

August 2013, is when it started.  I went through a lot of ideas.  One idea I stayed with for quite a while.  I'm onstage on a stool.  God is talking to me and I'm explaining how I became a clown.

As God asks me questions, I did sketches.  I had God saying lines like.  "You're a really good juggler, can you do 5?"

It was a funny idea but I dropped it because of amount of memorization I would have to do.  Or hire an actor for backstage to interact.  It was cumbersome.

I did a lot of brain storming. I settled on mine.  I did stories and sketches.  I really hadn't ever seen anyone do this with clowning.  It seemed so interesting.

I did the show then submitted the show to different festivals around the country.  I was rejected mostly but accepted into the San Francisco Fringe Festival.

I spent a big chunk of last year listening to autobiographies of comedians.  Marc Maron, Sarah Silverman, Howie Mandel, Amy Poehler, Artie Lange, Carl Reiner, Tina Fey, Lena Dunham, Mindy Koeling, Billy Crystal.  There are others I'm leaving off the list.  I listened to so many I can't remember.

I listened for structure.  Comedians structure their autobiographies like one man shows.

I did the show and not many people came.  I mean hardly anyone.  It killed me.  I would see people at the festival I knew, I had seen their shows and they didn't bother to come to mine.  I was pissed.  I will never do that to another performer.

I got a review in a local paper.  That was cool.  It was a lukewarm review but spot on.  Yes, I needed to work on the show.  That was the point of putting it up there, so I could go further.  The routines I've been doing in my show, I've been doing for years and years.  This was brand new.  I was discovering so much in this show.

At my last show, I felt my best show, because I had decided this is closing night.  I had 6 people in the audience.  When I finished, one guy looked at me and said, "this is the size of crowd you've been getting?  What a shame, what a shame"  He had a look of wow on his face. That was a cool


But no one came.  It just didn't call to people.  And that kills me.  And doing my taxes now and seeing my hope in the form of a cancelled check, hurts my heart.

What happened?

This is what it's like to be an artist.  This is why I'm so jealous of a regular life.  The lows are just so low.

There's something in that show that I can't let go.  I tried.  I lost money, I lost hope.

But I tried.

Taxes suck. 

Camera...what camera?

A camera catches a moment.  As a clown, I think of the camera catching one frame of a comic strip. A clown is a comic character, so any frame should be a little funny.

There is always a camera trained on you, whether you know it or not.  I use the word camera metaphorically.  I hate seeing any costume character, balloon maker, Elmo, Santa thinking no one is looking standing around looking dull.  They might as well be picking their nose for how pedestrian they look.

When you are in costume it's so obvious when you drop character. In regular clothes, who cares. When you are a clown stay in a pose, whether there is a camera on you or not.  Someone is always watching.

Just assume there is.

Because, I'm watching, I always am.  If I'm at an event and I'm not working, I watch the performers and I notice.  So does everyone else.  From across the room people see you.

As Santa, there are times no one is in line or sitting on my lap.  When no one is around.  I sit high on my chair and wave to kids walking by.   If I'm making balloons and no one is around, I make balloons for no one and keep myself busy and in character.  From a distance it's fun to watch.

Being a children's entertainer is tiring work.  It's very hard to stay in character, it takes a lot of energy but that's what you signed up for.  You can relax when you get home.

In the meantime, there is an iphone about to snap a picture of you and you don't even know it.  So pose.

The Time Santa Dropped a Baby...

I didn't do Sant for years.

I never had Santa growing up so I found it weird to do the character.  Santa was something in the other kids houses.  I didn't miss Santa, he struck me as pretty stupid actually.

Growing up to be a professional children's entertainer, lots of people wanted me to perform as Santa.

A Jewish friend of mine talked me into doing Santa.

The first year I did Santa, Santa made enough extra money to get me a new car.  Well half a car.  I made an extra $4500 over Christmas.  So now I do it every year.  That's a lot of money.

I'm a great Santa because I've been performing for so long.  I am intuitive and can read people.  I know what to do when kids are afraid, how to pose pictures and mostly how to create a complete character.  Once I put on the beard and belly, you can't break my focus.

How I made so much money that first year?  I landed a Santa gig at a large hotel every weekend for the month of December.  It was huge.  I sat in a big chair under a hundred foot tree and took pictures.
The downside, most people didn't know about this magnificent event. So I had to walk around finding people to take pictures with.

I had done Santa maybe 3 times when I dropped a baby.  yup.  dropped.  It wiggled out of my grip and clunked to the ground.

The baby was maybe 6 weeks old.  Splat.

There were a bunch of kids with me and I had the tiny baby in the crook of my arm.    All the kids leapt up at once when the picture was done and the baby slipped out...phhht.

I now keep a grip on babies.  That's something that can only happen once.  I'm like a professional football player, you can't get the baby out of my grip.

But once.  Just once, I dropped a baby.

Luckily it was only a few inches and children are made of rubber.  The baby hardly even cried.

But I felt bad.  Pathetic really.  With all my years of experience.  I dropped the baby.  The dad swooped him up and said, he's ok don't worry.

Santa had a very bad day.  

Super Dream...

I dream.

I dream vividly.

I nearly always remember my dreams.  Always have.

I've been super confronted with my life and career lately.  Am I any good at this clown thing?  Am I deserving of the praise I receive?

No.

I'm being interviewed soon by a reporter from a major publication.  I'm confronted.  He's asking me a lot of questions I don't feel worthy.  I can name 5 guys that are more interesting than me.

But I'm the one he's interested in.  I don't understand.  The more questions he asks, the more I feel like a failure as an artist.  Even that name "artist" makes me bristle.  I'm no more of an artist than the guy delivering mail.  I am a guy with a job.  A job that I can't escape.

Last night, I had a dream.  I was a correspondent on the Jon Stewart show.  A show I adore, watch nightly.  The combination of Jon Stewart leaving and me feeling like dung about my own talents must have caused my night.

I had a dream I was a correspondent on the Daly Show as a clown.  It made so much sense.  I did the set up interviews as "Nasty Ass the Clown"  my alter ego clown character.  I did the desk interview with Jon as Nasty Ass and made fun of politics.

My segments were funny and hard hitting.  I woke in the middle of the dream and was confused for a second why I was in bed.  It felt so real, like I shouldn't be here.  I'm supposed to be in New York.

I tried to get back to sleep so I could be on the show again.

Instead. I dreamt of my son going to college, my car breaking, my visa bill.  Things that I'm worried about right now.  I like the first dream way more.

I often wonder what my one dream would be.  If I could have anything?  For one REM cycle I was perfectly at home.  Fulfilled as an artist.