No Rodeo Clowning For Me

Did you ever hear the song "Mamas don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys," sang by the nonpaying 16 million in back taxes country singing star Willie Nelson?

I know it wasn’t necessary to add ole Willie Nelson’s unpaid tax woes, but sometimes when I’m writing a short or long story my thoughts in my written voice tends to shifts in 92 different subjects and directions.

I’ll get back on course of the subject matter Faster Than a New York minute. (As the title implies, this fact is about how quickly and drastically life can change. The underlying message is to treasure the good things you have because they could be gone tomorrow. New York City is famous for its frantic pace, thus a "New York Minute" is even faster than a regular minute), but is it faster than a Lunar minute? A Lunar minute is made up of 60 lunar seconds. A Lunar hour is made up of 60 lunar minutes. A Lunar cycle is made up of 24 lunar hour. A Lunar day is made up of 30 lunar cycles.

There I go again getting off tangent!

Sorry, Charlie we only accept the best tuna, (The Advertising Catchphrase [13013] "Sorry, Charlie" is one of the best known rejection lines in the American lexicon). 

But Willie didn't sing a thing about mama don’t let your sons to grow up to become rodeo clowns or bullfighters, at least not to my family.

My family has been in the rodeo clown, bronco riding and bullfighting business for over 100 years. A member of my family was a major part of William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) who created the first major rodeo and the first Wild West show in North Platte, Nebraska in 1882. 

A rodeo clown, bullfighter or rodeo protection athlete, is a rodeo performer who works in bull riding competitions. Originally, the rodeo clown was a single job combining "bullfighting", the protection of riders thrown from the bull, as well as being an individual who provided comic relief. Today in the United States, the job is split into two separate ones: bullfighters who protect the riders from the bull and entertainers who provides comic humor. However, in other parts of the world and at some small rodeos, the jobs of rodeo rider protection and comic remain combined.

I’m about 6’2” and they call me Slim Pickens. That’s a little too tall to be a rodeo clown. They don’t use stilts in the arena.  

I’m going to tell you “write” now I ain’t never going to be no rodeo clown or ride a bronco horse or try distracting a raging mad bull away from a rider who just got thrown off the bulls or horses back, until I break my neck or worst.

I’m planning on becoming a foot doctor (Podiatrist). I gotta thing for feet and not in a kinky and perverted way. I can’t say that becoming a podiatrist was my lifelong dream of becoming because it wasn’t my first choice. My first choice was becoming and actor like my American idol cowboy John Wayne until I watched on TLC “My Feet Are Killing Me”. One look at the pain in those patients eyes convinced me of what I needed to do for mankind.

It wouldn’t be easy trying to convince my family that I wanted no parts of becoming a rodeo clown. Besides my two older brothers still talk about what it feels like to be tossed in the air by a 1 ton bronco bull to stop a rider from going to the ER.

The rodeo clown is the back-up for the bullfighters and his barrel is his biggest asset. The barrel offers a refuge in the midst of the rodeo arena for cowboys and bullfighters, a place they can escape a charging, 1-ton bull when there are no close arena fences to climb.

Now can you imagine living with one of the rarest medical conditions in the world; having no one to confide in who understands the pain, struggles and isolation of everyday life. 75% of Americans will experience foot problems at one time or another in their lives. About 60% of all foot & ankle injuries aged 17 or older are ankle strains or sprains. About 6% of US population has foot injuries, bunions, flat feet or fallen arches each year.

How I was going to convince my family that there was a far better need for fixing feet than getting your feet or ankles broken severely by getting violently tossed by a horse or bull is another story. I know they’ll never understand that there is a whole big world out there besides rodeos. People forget about the feet all the time, but the minute anything is painful on your foot, that becomes the focus," you’ll definitely call upon a podiatrist. Looking after your feet is crucial, as foot health impacts your entire skeleton and pain in the feet can actually be a symptom of health issues elsewhere in the body.

Let’s say you develop a particularly bad fungal infection, the smell of which is overpowering and unmistakable. And it's actually far easier to get a fungal infection in your feet than you might think. Fungus in the nail is known as onychomycosis. I could never learn such 4 syllable words if I were to let a bull lower me to his standards. The fungus typically develops from micro-trauma from being in the shoes, as fungus normally resides in everyone’s shoes. People are often embarrassed from their feet and that's OK, because it’s better than getting inside of a wooden barrel and let a bull make a foot fool out of you.

Most professional foot doctors can treat the problem the patient comes in with and help them live with a better quality of life.

I will admit to my family today why I’ll never be a rodeo clown is the mere fact that I suffer from what is called Coulrophobia in which has been coined as an informal term for a severe fear of clowns.

To me there is something unnatural about the fact that clowns are always smiling. I’m logically aware that this red, painted smile is fake. Yet it makes it more difficult to tell me when the person wearing the makeup is showing actual emotions. Clowns are zany and crazy and part of their comedy is that you’re never sure what they will do next. There are many, many more reasons why I don’t want to dress up like Bozo the clown. In all honesty in spite of my fright and fears they’re just not all that funny to me.

5 years later as fate or destiny would dictate in a young man’s life and against my families insistence on we keeping the rodeo clown legacy alive.  

Today, I’m an underpaid New York City police officer.