Nov. 22, 2010
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Jellbean's creations can seem creepy
The Family Guy The clown's eyes are following me as I pace around the room, searching for inspiration. I've never had a specific phobia of clowns, though I suppose anything that smiles all the time and can be crammed 14 deep into a foreign hatchback lives on the near side of crazy. John Wayne Gacy, the portly contractor who killed and buried young boys under his Chicago house, liked to dress-up as a clown. Looking back, that's a tad unsettling … but not necessarily an image that kept me up at night. Pennywise, the cannibal clown (I guess “cannibal” is the right word, though he ate little kids rather than other clowns) from Stephen King's seminal coming-of-age-with-monsters novel “It” gave me nightmares for weeks. And that was back when I was a junior in college. Having braved throngs of giggling, pseudo-tipsy sorority girls, I knew a thing or two about terrifying. But still … clowns have never given me much pause. That was until this one — the one that's currently hiding on an old trunk in my office, its one blinkless eye staring up at me and the rounded edge of one grotesquely cheerful mouth grinning in my direction. Even buried beneath the debris of a freelance features writer – research books, newspaper clippings, etc. – it mocks me. "What'cha gonna do with me?” it calls out. “I'm still here, ya know. Don't look away or might come and gobble your face off.” 'Course that last bit is just my imagination in overdrive. My office is crammed with curious odds and ends, some of which speak to me when there's no one else around. Sometimes, I speak back. There's the dusty, plush Chewbacca doll, the framed poster of Johnny Cash lighting a cigarette backstage at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1966, the hear-no-evil, see-no-evil, speak-no-evil bookends, the numerous skulls, pictures of the family, antique moonshine jugs, mounted piranha and more books than I care to count, including a biography of Aleister Crowley (don't ask). I love my office. It's the one place in the house that truly belongs to me, meaning it can be as weird as I want it to be. It's also where Jellybean comes to play, fascinated by all of “Daddy's stuff.” She comes in here in the afternoons when Dora's gotten boring and the monsters of Scooby-Doo are too scary. Together, we watch the Smurfs on YouTube. And that's why the clown is staring up at me while I write, whispering, threatening me to throw him away. I can't. And the clown knows it. As soon as he gets crammed in with all the other garbage, that's when Jellybean will seek him. After all, she gave him life. Her tiny fingers, smeared with red paint, gave the clown his hair, a paper plate of her choosing serves as his head while and a pair of blue triangles cut out with safety scissors shaped his eyebrows. And while the clown is the most disturbing, he is not alone. There's also the pink pig made out of a small brown lunch bag and six sheep born of cotton balls. They all belong to Jellybean. The house, from the refrigerator to my office, is littered with such cute (occasionally creepy) arts-and-crafts creatures. She is the Dr. Moreau of this menagerie, its creator and master. To her they are a source of pride and creativity, but I am the one being tormented, haunted. Guess I'm going to have to rethink that whole clown-phobia thing. Brett Buckner is an award-winning former columnist for the Anniston Star. He lives in Columbus, Ga. with his wife, daughter and stepdaughter. His humor column appears regularly in The Post. Contract Brett at brett.buckner@yahoo.com. |