Being a Mom and a Maker
My dream job is to be a clown costume creator for the Nouveau Cirque. I’m still a clown!
Ten years ago today on Nov. 2, 2012 at 2:53 a.m. I became a mother to my wonderful daughter Zora. The crazy thing is that everything started on Halloween, which is my mother’s birthday! I started having contractions, so we put out the candy thinking she’d be born that night. My husband made a sign for the porch that said “Goblins and ghouls grab a treat” posted next to a skeleton holding a candy bowl because we were inside focusing on Zora’s birth. We’d planned a water birth, but my contractions never got strong enough and close enough. I walked around the ponds trying to induce my labor, but my water didn’t break all the way until the next day at noon. That night my midwives came and we walked around more in circles in my backyard while I chanted, “Come on baby, come on baby!” I eventually did go to the hospital where they hooked me up to monitors for my pulse and contractions. I clowned around dancing with the IV pole, and hypno-birthed and deep-breathed my way all the way through. I am so thankful for the homebirth midwives that advocated for me to have an (almost) all natural birth.
My daughter and I were born at opposite ends of the zodiac. I love teaching her to make art. She loves crafting and teaching her friends as well. This brings me a great deal of pride and joy. She follows in my footsteps (sometimes!) and this Halloween’s costume making was no exception. I have a collection of all kinds of materials and found objects in my costume boxes that we like crafting with. This year Zora is changing a lot as she navigates her evolving identity in the world. I love riding the waves of her becoming. I love being here with her as she grows, and can feel the intense churning of her burgeoning independent self. This year we weren’t quite able to get her costume to match what she imagined, but it all worked out in the end and we had a memorable and bonding time in the process. She was born on Day of the Dead Children. I honor her choice to come at this time of year, and I love having skulls around the house all year round. I wonder how else she will keep changing? I wonder if she will choose art? She’s been bathed in it all her life. Or who knows? Maybe she’ll rebel and be a doctor or a lawyer!
As for me: I love dressing up! I made my own clown pants. Did you know that one of my dreams is to make costumes? I love clowns! My dream job is to be a clown costume creator for the Nouveau Cirque. Even though clowns got a bad rap in recent horror films, I don’t think clowns are scary, and I don’t want my clowns to be scary. To me it’s like repurposing: bringing the clown back to its beautiful archetypal being, dressing it in handmade costumes of reused materials and old fabrics that resurrect times long ago. And who doesn’t need a clown and humor in their life? My dad is a clown and brings so much humor and love into our lives. I got a lot of my humor from him, and think choosing to be positive and colorful is a good way to live.
