Earlier today at a few minutes before 4pm CDT my mother, Charlotte Ann Jones Parks, died of multiple health complications that culminated in a bout of hepatorenal syndrome. She let go as my younger sister and I were holding a hand.
When I was nine years old, the September 1982 National Geographic World magazine – now NG Kids – featured a cover story on Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Clown College, then under the deanship of Ron Severini. Any clown geeks might also recognize this as the class that spawned Jon Weiss, formerly or RBBB and The Amazing Race, currently on Circus Vargas and seen on screen currently in Water for Elephants. At any rate, that was it; that was the one thing that changed my world and eventually my future path. I had never thought of being a clown before and this new idea that there was a place that you could go to learn to be one and maybe get a contract with RBBB just blew my head wide open.
As a child, I was one of those gifted students. Reading came early and easy and I seemed to have a propensity to learn easily and quickly and a lot. I liked big words, I liked showing how smart I was, and I liked the praise and attention. Normally a kid like that is supposed to do something brilliant, maybe something scientific. Somehow I knew intuitively that a gifted kid was not expected to "waste" his potential on something like becoming a clown. Throughout my later years, I actually fought this and went through periods of denying that I really wanted more than anything to become a clown. Not just a state-fair, dunk-tank, or birthday party clown, but a Ringling Brothers circus clown. I was supposed to be an engineer or maybe a doctor like my paternal grandfather. At the very least, I was supposed to be some type of scientist, I thought.
I remember going to my mom a little bit after having read that article – which I had kept for years and then threw away with other archival items in one of my greater teenage periods of denial and now regret having done – and asking her flat out:
"Would you be embarrassed to have a son who was a clown?" Or maybe it was "Is it all right if I want to be a clown?" I don't remember the exact words she told me, but I do remember the spirit and sentiment I received as my reply. I received a motherly smile and a hug and assurance that I could be whatever I wanted to be and that as long as I gave it my best and wasn't doing anyone any harm, she would be proud of me no matter what.
And she always had been. Thanks, mom.
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Thanks for sharing that Greg. I could picture her smile and hear her words. Everytime I saw her, she talked about how proud she was of you (all of you!)
ReplyDeleteEllen
This makes me smile so big...because my parents' reaction to my wanting to be an actress (pretty much since birth) was NOT so accepting or reassuring. I, too, was a gifted child with a huge vocabulary and voracious instinct to read and write and think, and I was told that being an actress would waste all of my skills -- that actors were dumb, that "anyone could play pretend", that "you don't need brains for that", and that I was throwing away all the contributions I could be making to society -- that I was a selfish idiot for having the career proclivities that I had. It pretty much got worse from there. :) SO -- HOORAY that there were good parents out there, that your mom saw how much joy and laughter you could bring to audiences all over the world with your acting, movement and clown skills. She knew what was what. :)
ReplyDeleteI can remember her smile and joy every time she came with your dad to see the Circus. She was so proud of you and what you were doing with your life. Her spirit was always such a warm presents that I've felt from you as well. I know where you got that from, and it's just another part of your mom that will live on through you.
ReplyDeleteI've always believed (and my parents have always affirmed it) that if you put your heart and soul into an occupation, it doesn't matter what it is. People always seem to ask me if I "like" being a clown, having a freelance, self employed lifestyle. YES, I have four jobs that I do, from clowning to cowboy, but I truly love what I do and wouldn't change a thing. I've always walked the path that has been laid out for me, and though some of the detours are not the best, they teach me to carry on to the better things that lay ahead. Stopping to say,"That's not right to do" was the one thing that my mom never did. She wanted me and my brother to find what we wanted to do, not by setting us limitations, but rather allowing us to have a broad scale view of everything. My parents (especially my mom) are in a large part responsible for who and what I am today as a performer, and for that I am eternally grateful.
Mom's have a great way of reassuring without ever having to say a word! But their smiles from the stands are the spotlight that shine the brightest onto us :O)