Sunday, April 27, 2008

Story of A Clown

Today is the day I have planned to narrate the story of a clown. Clowns are very lovable people to say the least. They make us laugh, so much so that we almost cry with laughter when off to a circus. So, today’s story will be about a clown. Let us assume that his name was Gogo, a name which is not his true identity, which is being hidden by the author for his and the clown’s own good.

Gogo used to work in a circus far far away from his hometown. Everyday he would come out and entertain the people of that city. He was very famous for being the clown that he was. People used to say, “Look at that clown, he is so dorky and strange! He is so weird, God, I wonder where they make such people?” His life of entertainment went on very smoothly, yet no one really saw what was hidden beneath that painted smile with varnish, and that red nose which little kids used to love to press. No one saw past his silly gimmicks, and no one really questioned them. After all, why should they? It did not concern them in any way.

Our friend Gogo was an emotional little clown. His heart yearned to go back home and spend time with his mother; after all, he was just twenty years of age. He yearned to make friends, to have a sweetheart, to feel loved. He yearned of a lot of things which he did not get. Sometimes, he smoked twenty cigarettes in a day. It was not as if he liked it, he needed it to keep his mind of the dull pain beating away with every heartbeat. Yet, he was the ‘happiest’ clown to the audience. He was the one who could make just about anyone laugh.

Some nights before sleeping, he used to look up at the ceiling of his ill-furnished room and tears flowed down his eyes. He himself did know why they came, yet he used to cry soundlessly, looking up at the ceiling, making sure that none of the other clowns could hear. His silent tears reflected insecurity, angst, pain, hate, jealousy – insecure about his future, whether going through all this would actually lead him to more despair or light is there somewhere at the end of the tunnel; angst at his bad luck, which was the only thing that never left him; pain where it hurt the most, for not being loved, for being a clown to everyone and nothing more; hate for the society which failed to recognize his true inner self, hate at himself for expecting anything from society; and jealous of all those people who get the company of they the people they love, of the people he loves.

Sadly, our clown never hoped. Hope was something our clown did not believe in and it kept him going. He never hoped to be loved, he never hoped to be back home someday, he never hoped about a better future. This myriad mixture of feelings created a balloon in side, growing everyday, waiting to burst unexpectedly, create clown sheek kebab. After all, one less clown in the world would not make a difference to anyone…

After Note: This story does come with a moral. But the author is not a preacher; hence he would like his readers to find their own moral in this story. It would not be difficult to find more than one moral in this story or none. This story is about no one in particular, but sometimes is for everyone in general.