by Eric J. Kolb
Ionce was very proud of my strength. Being the strongest, fastest and hard-est-working was very important to me. But as you may have guessed, my story doesn’t end with a gold medal. I’ve achieved much more.
My athletic career was terminated by an injury that may have been related to my muscular dystrophy, although I didn’t know at the time that I had MD. All I knew was the strength in my muscles leaked like a faucet.
So instead of pursuing athletics, I went to Ohio University in Athens and majored in math. I tried to put the same discipline into my studies that I had for sports, but something was missing.
It was passion.
Then one day I met some students from Germany who were juggling on the campus green. Overnight, I found my new passion — juggling. After graduation, I immediately took off for Europe to become a street performer. I trained hard, but finally had to face the fact that my right arm was becoming a twig.
Finally, I went to the doctor and learned what was happening to me: facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD). The strength in my arms, shoulders and back was running out like sand in an hourglass, and nothing could stop it.
I was shattered. I knew I had to be strong, stronger than ever before. But strength was something I’d always measured in pounds, repetitions or seconds. On this scale I was a failure.
But then a strength that had nothing to do with muscle came out of me, as I learned how to make people laugh. I’m sure you’ve heard that laughter is the best medicine, but making others laugh is even better.
I became a clown by accident. After having succeeded with my street act in Germany, I moved on to southern France, where the winters are milder. But the French weren’t impressed with my ability to juggle seven balls at once.
The only time I got a reaction was when I dropped a ball. My frustration was a hit with the French, so I changed my act and my failure became my success. When the balls collided in midair I’d run for cover. If I dropped one, I’d blame it on someone passing by.
That’s how I learned that it’s much more important how a clown does something than what the clown does.
My clown‘s name is Clou, which means something like “the secret ingredient.”
Clou doesn’t look much like a clown, because he doesn’t wear a red nose. Clowns only wear red noses so that everybody knows they‘re allowed to
laugh at them.
Clou wears a vest, tie and a black bowler hat in the style of the 1920s. Some recognize him immediately as a clown, while others just think he‘s a very strange person who constantly seems to be having problems because his props tend to have minds of their own.
I love sharing clowning with children, particularly those with illness or disability. Some say laughter can heal. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t. But when a child learns to laugh and then to make others laugh, his sickness may continue to disrupt his health but not his happiness.
Clowns don’t have disabilities. If there’s something a clown can’t do, it’s not a disability, just something they don‘t do.
Once I did a clown workshop in Germany for seven kids with muscular dystrophy, all in wheelchairs. The first thing I did was get them out of their wheelchairs and onto the carpet. We pretended we were under water and swam around, letting our fantasies run away with us.
After we’d started, some other kids walked by and asked to join the crazy fun.
It wasn’t until the workshop was over, when some kids stood up and others waited to be set back in their wheelchairs, that it became obvious who could walk and who couldn’t. I’ll never forget the kids’ faces as they suddenly realized
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