Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages. Step right up and welcome to your own personal three-ring circus. You’re the Ringmaster, the Big Top is your noggin and the center ring is your brain. The Greatest Show on Earth is playing out in your heart and head day after day after day. Cue the calliope music . . .
Witness the impossible with the Mind Reader. She can tell what someone thinks about her without even asking. No one has to say a word. She can just make it all up in her head and convince herself it’s true. She can tell if someone is mad at her, or hates her, or is annoyed by her simply by creating a scenario and then believing it.
There’s the daring feat of strength of sticking to a new diet. Although I don’t think we call it dieting anymore, it’s a lifestyle change. Either way, we trick ourselves into thinking we are satisfied with our meal of kale leaves and then deserve a treat later for being so “good.” It’s called balance, just like walking on a tightrope. Sword swallowers have it easier.
There is one daring feat of strength I hope to perfect in the future. Burning calories by rolling my eyes.
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My own circus specialty is acrobatics of the mind. When I’m lying in bed wide awake, I perform a little sideshow, thinking about indulgent recipes I want to cook and my grand plan to lose weight and keep it off this time.
It’s no human cannonball, but hiding things in plain sight is a simple trick any parent can master. I’ll give you the secret. It’s easy and impressive. If you to want to hide a birthday or Hanukkah present from your kids all you have to do is leave it front and center in the hallway near their bedrooms, or the lower steps leading upstairs. They’ll never touch it, look at it, or move it.
The famous strongman routine of using comedy as a defense mechanism is a classic. Deflect jabs and insults by making a joke. Poke fun at yourself before anyone else has the chance. Turn that defense mechanism into an art form, and you might just get your own column in a newspaper one day.
See breathtaking displays of talent in your mirror while doing your hair and makeup. When you have straight hair, you make it curly. When you have curly hair, you make it straight. Heat and products damage your hair in its natural form, but you’re a contortionist. You can do all kinds of Kardashian level contouring to create a thinner nose or cheekbones where you have baby fat. Or grown-up fat. The transformation from the real you to new you is a grand spectacle of epic proportion.
You fly through the air with the greatest of ease, holding on tight to your emotional flying trapeze.
Life is a juggling act. We have lots of balls in the air at the same time. Some are filled with sugar and rainbows. Some are filled with poison and shards of glass. Might as well just jump through rings of fire while wearing flammable fabrics and hope for the best. Send in the clowns.
