So Why Can't I Run Away and Join The Circus?

Dear Circus Director:

Let me begin by thanking you for a most enjoyable family night out this past November when your Circus Show came to our city. My husband and I took our three children and had a fabulous time.You do a fantastic job of keeping the acts in all three rings going and I love the look of your stretchy white pants against the pressed red coattails of your frock coat; formal yet whimsical. Way to go!

With all the people I saw under your direction that night, I can tell you are a busy man. Let me get right to the point of this letter and tell you that I have decided to run away and join the circus. Your circus, as a matter of fact, as it's the only circus I'm familiar with. You also keep your travels confined to the United States, that's good. While I enjoy travel abroad as much as the next guy, I prefer to begin any circus internship on this side of the pond.

If you're shaking your head already making a premature decision thinking that this is a case of wanderlust, you would be wrong. But if you bat around the idea of mid-life crisis as a reason, you might be on to something.

You see, lately, I've been having these wonderful dreams of flying, on a trapeze, where I swing from room to room and the feeling of sailing and changing across trapeze bar to trapeze bar is so real I can hear and feel the whoosh of the wind rushing past me. After my fifth night of dreaming like this, I knew I had to contact you.

I can touch my toes, and weigh in at a trim 120 pounds. I can't even think about a trapeze bar without a shiver of excitement catching in my breath. I want to sail over the huge net below. I want to leap from bar to bar, heart pounding, adrenaline surging and fly until someone calls for me to let go; and I fall through the air, landing on the strong net, bouncing twice back up into the air first.

Before you tell me that there is little demand for clumsy middle aged women, let me assure you that I am turnkey talent. I could fill many roles for you. I have worked as a fortune teller, warning others that they will fall and break their necks if they don't stop jumping off that kitchen table now. I have performed magic tricks, feeding five from two chicken breasts. (slice and dice anything and you've got yourself a stir-fry)

Though not flexible, I am reliable. I can set up and tear down with the burliest of the bunch. You should have seen me at the outdoor graduation party last June when the tornado sirens went off. I have taught my sixteen year old son how to drive on the freeway, proving that I laugh in the face of danger.

I make twenty-one hour days look like a walk in the park, and am no stranger to cleaning up poop and sweeping out cages.

Am I too old for this? 

Please let me be the one to answer that.

I can understand why you'd be hesitant, Sir, but all I'm asking for is a night on a low flying trapeze. I want to hang, dangle, fly, float, glide, like the woman in the Residence Inn Commercial.

If it's a matter of salary, please don't let that play into your decision: my life already consists of non paid performances throughout my day, so anything you offer will be an improvement.

I also supply my own Spandex (well, technically, it's Spanx, but who's gonna look.)

 Just 30 seconds, Sir, to feel the wind through my hair. That's all I ask for.

Thank you.

Video: Residence Inn
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