The Smile

Many years ago I was a very silly man. As a grandfather I'm still a very silly man but that's another story. In my twenties I was a clown. I rode unicycles, juggled and made balloon animals.
I worked for nightclubs, churches, company parties, malls and many birthday parties.
The more popular I got the less I enjoyed it and the more mistakes I made in my performances.
After one disastrous show I decided it was time to give up clowning. I agreed to one last show for a large church complex.

Before shows I would goof with people trying to get a smile or a laugh from everyone I meet. I went over to a young couple with a tiny bundle in the woman's arms.
I peeked into the tiny bundle and saw a small unhealthy baby. I made a funny face and then smiled at the infant. At first the tiny baby looked confused but then returned the smile.
The parents looked shocked. They looked at me as if I was an alien from another planet.
The glowing smile from the baby warmed my heart but the parent's strange looks unnerved me.

I moved on and began to goof with more people. The show was in the round and I wasn't the only clown performing. I jumped in did my gags and jumped back out of the circle letting others do there thing. I was happy because an old vaudevillian who taught me juggling was performing for one of the last times that day. I was ending my life as a clown with good company.

Then a friend was going to perform his puppets in public for the first time. The minister introduced him in a way he didn't like and he refused to do the show. The audience became upset and some of the children asked out loud "what happened to the puppet show?". As a gentleman hobo clown I had to save the show. I turned to a lady hobo clown and asked;

"May I have this dance?"

Music began to play as if a clown band had formed. We danced in a large looping spirals.
I suddenly realizes I'm hearing the puppet show music with two clown musicians playing over and matching the recorded music. We begin doing spins and throw each other around like rag dolls and the audience loves it. We exited the circle and laughed that our ad lib routine came off so polished. A few more clowns preformed and the show was over.

I was changing into my street clothes in the tent set up for the men clowns when I heard a young man on the other side of the tent talking to the minister.

"A clown made my son smile and my wife and I want to thank him."

"What my husband is trying to say is our son smiled for the first time today. He's six months old with cerebral palsy and we never taught him to smile."

"We always looked at our son with worry and pity but never joy. We realized our son can have joy in his life because a clown made funny faces at him."

The minister said he would help them find me but for some reason I didn't want to be found.
It was all too perfect. I left without another word as the clown world got smaller in the rear view mirror of my station wagon.

Sometimes when I'm sad I think of the smile and joy fills my heart.

Next post; The Invisible Picnic