A very few brave twigs send out some early flowers in lemony yellow-green...
...and sometimes cherry-red.
Meanwhile, the circus has come to town at the Wollman Rink.
The blue peaked tents of the plucky African-American themed Universoul Circus have sprouted, along with some suitably raffish conveyances. There are hip-hop elephants, child contortionists from Guinea, and other marvels to be seen during their gig from March 26 through April 13, and ticket prices start at a gentle $17.
On the troupe's website, I enjoyed this candid story of their rocky start from founder Cedric Walker (a former promoter of the Jackson 5), because it sounded like something that would happen to our Walker family (well, if we tried to tame tigers):
Three weeks
before the opening (in 1993), I paid a visit to the training facility. It was clear that
the person we chose wasn't working out. After watching rehearsals all that
flashed in my mind was possible the headlines: “FIRST BLACK CIRCUS. TIGER EATS
TRAINER ON OPENING DAY.” So I fired the guy. I'm three weeks away from
advertising this black lion tamer and I'm sitting in my office at 11 p.m.
saying to myself, “Okay Cedric, you've really done it this time. Now you've got
to go into the lion's cage.” I was attempting to convince myself that I could
do it, when, thank you Jesus, I thought about my “crazy” cousin who lived with
three 14 feet boa constrictors in his bedroom. I had a feeling he would be
interested in the job. I called his home that night. By six the next morning,
he had quit his job and was ready to join the circus.
The first show lost every penny. But the idea was successful…
TNT Update: Those of you riveted by the unfolding drama of my biking attire will be gratified to learn that I wore the stretchy-pants today (under another pair of sweatpants, since it felt like winter out), and they were surprisingly comfortable. However, even XL stretchy-pants are clearly designed for ladies with the body-fat level of a greyhound (and we'll leave it at that). The things I do to cure cancer.
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