The Circus

As I was driving into my local mall to buy a grossly over priced and unneeded pair of sneakers, I saw a very large orange tent set up in the middle of the parking lot. "Just what we need, another tent sale" I thought as I manuvered around the detor. Turning into the last remaining parking space in the lot I noticed a big fluttering vinyl sign that snapped in the wind. Black letters proclaimed to the world at large " Circus Entrance". "I'll be damned, a circus!"
In the modern world that we live in today the circus has become a traveling nostalga show. Every child goes through the right of passage of attending the circus for the first time. As time has passed, the enjoyment that can be derived from the circus decreases as we become more "sophisticated".
When my mother was a child in the 1950's she lived in a working class home (Read: Poor). And her father was one of the original "grumpy old men"and didn't have the money to waste on the circus. Early one morning my Grandfather shook my mother awake and told here to get dressed. After putting on her dress, they hopped into the family car, a 1 ton 1950 Ford truck with cattle racks and traveled down the river road to Wheeling, West Virginia. My Grandfather wove the huge red truck down through the empty streets of Wheeling to the train station. When they found a parking spot next to the tracks my mothers face lit up like it was Christmas! Her gruff father had brought her to see the circus train arrive and unload. Camels, Zebras, Lions in cages, and her favorite the horses all were being unloaded. Then the elephants came lumbering from their train car. Their trainer led them down the track past the truck and stopped to talk to another man from the circus. It must have been a tiring trip for the elephants because the last one in the line sat on the front fender of the truck! Smashing it in the process. My Grandfather kept a knife in the truck that he used for everthing. Monday it was used to castrate bulls and Friday it would be used to cut salami for lunch. Grandfather took that knife and poked the elephant in the rump to get him off his fender.
My mother remembered that morning her entire life. She never got to actually see the circus but the fact that her father thought enough to take her to the train ment the world to her.

When I was a child in the early 70's a Circus came to the local arena. and Mom wanted to take me and my 7 Cousins to the show. Dad packs all the cousins, myself, and Mom into his pride and joy, a 1964 Cadillac Fleetwod with Batman Tail Fins! Now if you have never had the opportunity to see an early 60's Cadillac back seat, think of the biggest couch you have ever seen in your life and then put a package shelf in the rear window that is a little smaller then the state of Texas. You now have an idea what it looks like. But even that amount of room will not hold eight kids with out someone sitting on a lap. My cousin Tom was the smallest and he sat on the floor at the feet of my cousin ILa. Now Tom's parents owned a bar. Back then it was called a "Beer Joint". And even in the dark ages before cable TV and Video Games we could amaze adults with our grasp of the four letter word. And Tom had studyed at the Beer Joint University! Ila not wanting to cause any inconvience to anyone didn't bother to tell anyone that she had slowly been getting car sick. And she proceeded to vomit on Tom! Nothing can quite match the screech of a 7 year old boy screaming a the top of his lungs "THIS SON OF A BITCH PUKED ON ME!!!!"

We made it to the circus and we treated Tom in the only way we could........... we made him sit alone. Far, Far away from us.

Ahhh... Those Circus Memories!!!