Han(d) Solo

(I know you can probably derive some inappropriate joke from that title, but let's take a leap out of the gutter, shall we?)

The other night I did my first face painting gig by myself. All summer I would do balloons or paint with the clowns I work with, and eventually I was just with another assistant/partner in crime. However, this time I was 100% on my own, which made me kind of nervous because here's the thing:

I'm the girl who in fourth grade tried to draw a horse, and my own mother couldn't decipher what it was. I'm the girl who could only draw a picture if I did that thing where you draw a grid on it and then replicate the picture square for square. I'm the girl who chose to write the paper over the "artistic" option for school projects. Basically, I've never been artistic, but I've been working really hard this summer to change that.

And I do alright now--with face paint, that is.

So anyway, I went to my first birthday party for this Vietnamese girl. (Seriously, Asians have the cutest kids.) The minute I knew it was an Asian party, I knew it was going to be an Asian party. Here's the thing about Asians, they always seem to know all the other Asians in the area. For example, this whole party was Vietnamese. And they all spoke Vietnamese to each other. Guess who doesn't speak Vietnamese? Me. Guess who felt like an extreme outsider*? Me. I think I was just worried that they were talking about my face painting skills.

Everything went okay, and I think most of the kids were happy (except the girl for whom I drew a panda. That was just bad. How am I supposed to remember what they look like?? It's not like I'm Asian!**) I was about to leave when the mom insisted that I have cake. Then she insisted that I eat the extremely authentic food they prepared. I actually ate pork for the first time in over five years because I was so afraid of offending them. (I'm sorry vegetarian gods!) I even had this soup that I had to slurp really loud to show my approval.

Needless to say, I was there for an extra hour and a half just eating Vietnamese food and trying to make conversation. They had fun saying Vietnamese things to me and laughing because I didn't understand. Smile and nod; smile and nod; smile and nod...

It was a noche muy cultured.

*I'm not implying that they didn't have the right to be speaking their own language. I'm not one of those "This is Amurica!" kind of Americans. Rather, I desperately wished I could communicate with them in their language. Rosetta Stone? Don't mind if I do!

**That was pseudo-racism, I swear. (It's hard when you don't know who is reading this.)

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One thing I like about being home is that I see more children around. In Provo, there seems to be one age group: 18-25 (give or take). Yes, of course I've had people bring babies to class, but for the most part I hadn't interacted with children for a long time.

Did I ever mention that I work for a clown? Because I do. And it's awesome. I am a balloon artist and a burgeoning face painter to boot. We are slowly removing the stigma that Stephen King put on clowns years ago with his novel/movie It. (Why does it seem that every young adult was accidentally subject to that movie as a child?)

Well, this job allows me to talk to little kids again, and I forgot what a special experience that can be. They aren't worried about the debt ceiling or the stock market or social security. They still dream big and are impressed by a sword balloon. The other day I was making balloons for two 13 year-olds, and I was relieved to hear that they weren't too old to like Justin Bieber.

Being exposed to so many kids has made me so much more sensitive to the known and unknown issues in their lives. I'm not a social worker or therapist by any means, but I can pick up on things kids say that indicate things may not be going so well at home. Sometimes you can just see it. And all I can really do about it is make a balloon or talk about Power Rangers with them.

Then I find myself praying. Praying that they can always have that optimism that they have now. Praying that they can always feel loved and accepted. And praying that the world gets a little kinder, a little simpler, and a little better.