Circus plays a large part in my life but it didn't start with Cat's Art MusikCircus and one of the biggest highlights was when a friend of mine was working for Ringling Brothers / Barnum & Bailey Circus.
The Circus was coming to Cincinnati and my friend wanted me to see their show. We didn't live in the same cities so she said she would arrange for tickets. Go to the box office and there will be two tickets for 'will call' so tell them your name and it's all set.
There was no way to know how really 'all set' it was until the Mystery Lady and I got there. My friend didn't simply provide tickets, she got us tickets in the section right on the ring with all the circus family people around us.
There is Circus and then there's Circus with the people who live it and this is the grand tradition which goes back to the earliest times. Humans have loved Circus since the first times as far back as we first learned how to domesticate animals. If we're not going to eat them or use them to plow fields then let's watch them.
Words can't describe Circus but all those elephants really struck me. My friend had a deep, deep love of elephants and she regularly went to see them when they were not performing because she wanted to know for herself they were receiving good care. She assured me absolutely these animals are not being mistreated. She was very much the New York sophisticate but she didn't mind at all going down into the stalls to see the animals, that was a large part of the sophistication.
There are times when one tries to figure out what 'gezellig' means and then there are times when you're already there and you know it already from your trips to the circus but this was such a special one.
Note: gezellig is Dutch and there isn't an English translation for it beyond supreme coolness or something. Maybe we could just go with it's the opposite of what you feel when you watch a political debate.
(Ed: what's the moral to the story?)
No moral. This is a dumb luck story. Cat and I were talking about serendipity earlier.
The Circus was coming to Cincinnati and my friend wanted me to see their show. We didn't live in the same cities so she said she would arrange for tickets. Go to the box office and there will be two tickets for 'will call' so tell them your name and it's all set.
There was no way to know how really 'all set' it was until the Mystery Lady and I got there. My friend didn't simply provide tickets, she got us tickets in the section right on the ring with all the circus family people around us.
There is Circus and then there's Circus with the people who live it and this is the grand tradition which goes back to the earliest times. Humans have loved Circus since the first times as far back as we first learned how to domesticate animals. If we're not going to eat them or use them to plow fields then let's watch them.
Words can't describe Circus but all those elephants really struck me. My friend had a deep, deep love of elephants and she regularly went to see them when they were not performing because she wanted to know for herself they were receiving good care. She assured me absolutely these animals are not being mistreated. She was very much the New York sophisticate but she didn't mind at all going down into the stalls to see the animals, that was a large part of the sophistication.
There are times when one tries to figure out what 'gezellig' means and then there are times when you're already there and you know it already from your trips to the circus but this was such a special one.
Note: gezellig is Dutch and there isn't an English translation for it beyond supreme coolness or something. Maybe we could just go with it's the opposite of what you feel when you watch a political debate.
(Ed: what's the moral to the story?)
No moral. This is a dumb luck story. Cat and I were talking about serendipity earlier.
No comments:
Post a Comment