A happy throng of clowns invades Durham, honking blues away

Sara Bloo burst into the bar wearing a mop of a blue wig, waving an insistent hello as her oversized spats smacked the floor and honking an old-fashioned bugle horn that jutted from the pocket of her houndstooth coat.

She ordered a gin and tonic and joined the other clowns outside on the lawn at Bull McCabe’s — an assembly of two dozen merrymakers with faces painted red, white and blue, sending a chorus of squeaky-toy noise into the Durham night.

What I witnessed as a drably attired guest was the first Triangle Honks Clown Crawl, an all-night gathering of friends sporting circus attire and unabashed silliness, determined to frolic through a world turned increasingly gloomy.

Well past midnight, this collection of clowns wandered from night spot to night spot, injecting hot pink and neon green into a sea of beige and gray.

“I wanted to spread joy and promote adults having fun,” said Bloo, the event’s ringleader, a 3D printer by day. “The world is pretty dark.”

At 34, Bloo — and yes, that’s the name she always uses — has been clowning for more than a decade, and her clown-craft has grown so skillful that she can apply her makeup in 30 minutes, including the heart on the tip of her nose.

“I started out miming,” she explained, “but I didn’t like miming since you can’t talk.”

Her wig is hand-made from yarn made out of recycled plastic, and her blue-and-white shoes came by special order. But when she dreamed up the clown crawl, she extended the invitation to clowns of all season — first-timers welcome.

“The world is in dire need of your silly honking about,” she wrote on the Facebook post. “Won’t you answer to the call of the clown.”

I lasted for only the first stop on the Durham tour, and the clown ranks were approaching 30. All of their stops on the crawl got advanced notice, and none of them turned down a clown.

“One of the best responses was, ‘Is clown money still green?’” said Erik Yowell, a user experience engineer decked out in white face paint and a studded leather jacket. “Every culture has had the fool, the jester, the clown.”

Several pointed out that not only does clowning qualify as an ancient practice — the oldest known date to Egypt’s Fifth Dynasty — but donning the wig and cone-shaped hat can actually be therapeutic.

Sure, many people harbor a clown phobia, and the idea of a clown as a horror character is fed by the ongoing popularity of Stephen King’s “It” and every haunted Halloween house.

But some clowns, I learned, are recovering fraidy-cats, socking their fears right in the prosthetic nose.

“You don’t have to look out for clowns when you’re dressed like one,” Yowell said.

Still, there is something about garishness and buoyancy in public that brings out the darkness in people. We’re all familiar with the human tendency to find sport in bringing others down, and a few non-clowns around the bar tried to wreck the fun.

But Bloo, a veteran at deflecting negative energy, suggested we simply step outside and rejoin the clown pack. An excellent idea, and just like that, all the grayness lifted. A spirited attendee named Cat Panda made me a giraffe out of a yellow balloon.

As the vibes grew palpably more positive, Bloo stood on a picnic bench and announced through a bullhorn that the party must keep moving.

“Follow the clowns!” she called out, launching into the familiar clown anthem, “Entry of the Gladiators.”

And so the clowns crawled on, parting the clouds as they went.