Making Circus Dreams Come True

See that good looking bloke up there?

That’s my nephew living the dream. Who’s dream? Well, just about every kids dream out there.

My nephew ran off to join the circus.

Ok, he hasn’t technically joined the circus yet, he’s in training. In the background, on the wall, is the name of the organization he’s training with: The Circus Center, you can see it proudly displayed across his shirt as well.

I forgot to ask Jeremiah if he always wanted to join the circus as a kid. From my perspective, I don’t think he did. When he was younger, I remember him running. Running, running, running and more running. He was on the cross country team for school. Seriously, he looked like a gazelle running because he’s so tall. Then, as he got older he started college as a double major in math and science. That’s right, he’s a big ol’ nerd too (we are proud of nerd status in this family. 100% compliment).

When Jeremiah was younger I took him to his first Renaissance Faire, and I like to credit myself with where he has taken this inspiration, but I’m sure he probably won’t agree. Ok, I’m sure he won’t, but you never know where life’s little experiences will come in to shape your future, so I’m going to go ahead and take my tiny sliver of credit. The reason I credit the Renn Faire for where he is now, is because after he attended his first Renn Faire, he kept going back. He joined the Renaissance Club in high school, and he is still active in participating/working Renn Faires whenever he gets the chance. He works as a vendor and a street performer, dancing and doing some acrobatics.

After he graduated high school, and after he’d had a taste of college life, he started going to the Sokol Gymnasium in Omaha. Normally they end registration when you’re 18, but he was 20 at the time. They have a philosophy of keeping people healthy and engaged, so they allowed him to enroll. This gave him the opportunity to improve his gymnastics skills and work muscles must of us don’t even know we have.  He spent three years in gymnastics training before moving to Kansas, and that’s when he took a bit of a break.

That break stopped when he found The Last Carnival in 2014. This is where he started Aerial classes and trained with silks instructor Rachel McMeachin from Thieves of Flight. He even had the opportunity to train in her studio when he went on to some more impressive stuff with the bigger silks. I wanted to go watch him perform on the silks at the one performance we could get tickets to, but I couldn’t make it to the show. I did see some of the performance on Facebook thanks to his friends tagging him in videos. Thanks guys. I don’t know you, but I appreciate it!

When Jeremiah wanted to keep improving his skills he found he needed classes The Last Carnival didn’t offer, so now he’s in San Francisco training at The Circus Center, which is a non-profit organization.

That’s right, this is the point my nephew quit his job and ran off to join the circus. Our entire family is proud and excited about this decision because it’s awesome. It’s as simple as that. Someone with the talent to join a circus like this is awesome and he’s in our family!

He’s only been there three months and they’re pushing his training in four areas: strength, flexibility, tumbling and handstands. According to his instructor, Xiaohong Weng, acrobatics are a combination of these four areas. They’ve placed weights on him to deepen his stretches, he’s polished his rusty tumbling skills, and he’s improved his handstands.

During his first month there he averaged about 4.5 hours of training a day, by his second month he was training for 5 to 8 hours a day. Since he’s been there he’s trained in the flying trapeze, trampoline, hand balancing, partner acro, chinese hoop diving and chinese pole.

Here’s a little taste of his partner acro with his partner Myriam Bloom doing shoulder to shoulder. Kids…don’t try this at home. Join The Circus Center and try it there after hours upon hours of training.

It’s going to be some time before I’ll get the chance to watch Jeremiah on stage. Watch for him in the coming years. I know he’ll be performing somewhere, sometime. If you ever go to a show and see him, please let me know!

Have you ever wanted to join the circus? Which act most inspired you? Tell me in the comments.