1# How I made my clowing-out and live my dream, to be a clown.

Hi there,

This is my first steemit article. I've registered on this site two days ago and hence still figuring out how this site works but already excited to know a bit more about it.

Sorry for my english which is not my mother tongue, however I'll try to do my best and hope you guys will understand me.

So the first topic here will be about the greatest decision of my life, how I became clown.

Since I am a child I've always been passionate about circus arts and particularly clowns. I loved going to the circus with my parents to see the clowns and laugh.

Then when I grew up, I still had the passion for circus and, in a certain way, secretly dreamt one day to bump a red nose myself. Although I was too shy.

Years passed and when I was a teenager, altough clowning was still my interest, I was more interested in playing guitar with a metal band. I've played with differents bands of extreme metal, death and even black metal !

At the age of 22, I decided to take part of the first clown workshop, organized in Switzerland. The purpose of this workshop was to find our own clown, our inner child. I remember that the first three clown workshops I followed were so weird because we had to learn how being ourselves and act fool independently of what people thought about us. I found it hard to act independently of what other people think about us, acting without the fear of being judged.

For about eight years, I never stopped thinking about putting on red a nose but was never able to make the move.

It's only when I turned 33 that I decided to get into a stage and started standup comedy. The feeling of being on stage in front of an audience was just awesome. And I liked it very much, telling (heavy)jokes in front of an audience, being funny, seeing people laugh was just a great experience.

But this was not enough, after 4 years I've realized that I was still missing something. Although I was performing on a stage and make people laugh, the real funny thing to my eyes was clowning.

So in 2014 I decided to leave the standup comedy progressively and reoriented my energy to clown art. This was my dream, being a clown.

I started to learn how to juggle, to make balloon animals and decided to jump straight "to the cold water" by performing as a clown, in the streets of Geneva.

The first 3 street improvisations were so hard. Before putting my red nose I had my 3 beers with me, to give me the gut to clown in public. Then I realized that if I wanted to be a clown, I should go without these "3 beers" and the 4th time I put my red nose, took my juggling balls and start clowning/juggling in public. This was just an incredible feeling, being alone, myself, in front of a public, with my red nose and my legs shaking ! No time to think about future, nor the past. Only present is important when clowning.

Since that time, I've started to do some kids party animation as a clown and loved it. Then continued with street animation.

Today I want to live my life and realize my dream. I want to be a clown.

I would like to thank my wife which has always been supporting me in this project. At first she was surprised as clowning is not as usual as playing bass guitar in a band. But she understood completely and since the beginning encourages me although she never thought one day her husband would be a clown.

Next articles will be about the progression about my clown experience.

Thank you.

Ernesto