|
Shriners send in clowns to spread cheer
Mark Zaretsky, Register Staff, 12/26/2006
-NEW HAVEN — Did you hear the one about the five Jewish clowns in a ward at the Hospital of St. Raphael on Christmas Day ? A nurse says to one clown: "Merry Christmas!"
"Oh, is it Christmas?" the clown answers.
OK, maybe it’s a bad joke, but it was a funny reality if you were stuck in the hospital over Christmas, either as a patient or an employee working on the one day when almost everyone else was home with their loved ones.
Is it a bird? Is it a plane?
No, just five jingling, jangling, hugging and honking clowns from the Shriners Pyramid Temple in Milford — all Jewish — trying to make people happy on a day that can be hard on folks who don’t have all the trappings of a traditional Christmas.
On Hankee! On Blinkee! On Dizzy! On Huggy! On Big Eyes!
Just imagine: clowns packed into elevators...
Clowns sacked out on gurneys...
Clowns jingling around the ward while you’re trying to take care of paperwork...
Clowns — two of them in wheelchairs that looked like part of the gag but weren’t — filling your hospital room with a sea of neon yellow and red hair, white greasepaint, big cherry noses and multi-colored clothing, leaving a trail of orange "I Hugged A Clown" stickers.
Why do it?
"To put smiles on their faces and make them happy!" said "Blinkee," aka Harold Hankin of North Haven, president of the Pyramid Temple clown unit.
"What are you doing here?" one clown asked Laura Green of East Haven as he barged into her room in a fourth floor ward of St. Raphael’s Celentano wing. "Get outta here!"
"What do you want to hear for Christmas?" asked "Big Eyes," the clown alter-ego of retired Westville restaurateur Hy Katz, who has donned the two-foot-long shoes of a Shriner clown for 37 years — and entertained folks in the hospital for 25.
"Jingle Bells!" replied Green, who has been in and out of the hospital for more than three months with pneumonia, as Big Eyes pulled out a kazoo and began to serenade her.
He then slipped her a big $20 bill — about three times the size of a real one — as a chorus of clowns told Green, "Hey, you’ve got some BIG MONEY now!"
"I hugged a clown, you know!" Green told nurse Dawn DiNuzzo of East Haven after the clowns left.
"I hugged one, too!" said DiNuzzo, giggling like a kid.
Shriners are an offshoot of the international Masons fraternal organization. They are best known — besides their fezzes, clowns and little cars at parades — for raising money to support Shriners Hospitals for Children, which provide free medical care for children who need it.
Shriner clowns usually perform to raise funds for hospitals, but also do "freebies" like the St. Raphael visit, said Blinkee.
Meanwhile, the clowns had descended to the third floor, where they introduced themselves to patient Marie Cavallaro, also of East Haven.
"This is Dr. Vinnie Boombatz from Dairy Queen Medical School," said Big Eyes, just before breaking out his kazoo again, this time to play "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" as his buddies sang.
"These guys are pathetic!" said "Dizzy," the stand-up comic of the bunch, also known as Shriner Mark Kaplan of Hamden.
Cavallaro, who had been in for three days for dialysis, didn’t think it was pathetic at all.
"That was wonderful!" she said. "It just brightened up my whole day ... I think what they’re doing is wonderful!"
The clowns didn’t advertise the fact that they all were Jewish. When Cavallaro learned it, her eyes brightened.
"So is my doctor!" she said.
And while she had plenty of respect for her real doctor, Cavallaro said she "most assuredly" felt better after "Dr. Boombatz" and his cronies left her room.
Outside Cavallaro’s room, Gwenda McCarter of West Haven, a member of St. Raphael’s environmental services crew, smiled as the flock of clowns jingled slowly by.
"It’s nice," McCarter said. "They make people smile. They make us smile," she said. "Actually, they made me smile, ‘cause I was feeling a little down."
For two of the clowns, wheelchair rolling "Blinkee" and "Hankee" — who in real life are twins Howard Hankin and Michael Hankin, also of North Haven — the ability to make people laugh is a gift that helps them transcend they’re own problems.
The Hankin brothers both were born with cerebral palsy and became clowns a decade and a half ago as a way to help cheer up other people suffering from debilitating diseases, said Michael Hankin.
The fifth clown is "Huggy," aka Shriner Gary Matican of Hamden.
The clowns saved some of their best gags, however, for their visit to Elizabeth Petrucelli of Milford, who was with husband, Michael Petrucelli, her head shaved, recovering from surgery to remove a benign tumor in her head.
"We’ve been married 54 years," Elizabeth Petrucell told the clowns.
"To this guy? You’re a saint!" said Dizzy.
"We’re very blessed," said Petrucelli.
"Look at my head," she told Dizzy, pointing to a three-inch line of stitches on the top left side of her shaved head.
"Well, it’s what’s here that counts," Dizzy said, cupping clown hands to his very real, human heart.
As the clowns walked out, a couple of them almost bumped into Petrucelli’s. daughter, Annmarie Isler of Fairfield, who was on her way in — wearing reindeer antlers and red Christmas ornament earrings — with her husband, Hans, and children Eric, 8, and Phoebe, 10.
"I’m happy," Petrucelli said after the clowns left and her daughter gave her a red Santa Claus cap to wear on her head. "It put me in a happy mood."
The clowns’ visit also put a smile on the face of nurse Kristen Buccieri of East Haven, who doesn’t mind working because "people are sick here" and "need someone to take care of them."
Buccieri, who also wore a Santa cap, said, "I want to bring people a little Christmas spirit — and I think the clowns did a really good job of that!
"They gave everybody hugs," she said
Mark Zaretsky can be reached at mzaretsky@nhregister.com or 789-5722.
©New Haven Register 2006
Pyramid Klown Membership 2007 the names with an *** 20yrs.members and are 65yrs.old and do not pay dues any longer. *are associates and pay dues
President First Vice President #9933
Howard ‘Blinkee ’Hankin #9764 Richard ‘Eppe’ Epstein Gail
18 Pool Road 39 Cranbury Road
North Haven Ct.06473 Norwalk Ct 06851
203-985- 8289 203-847-4322
home 239-0042 cell- 856-5584
e-mail-hankinhoward@sbcglobal.net e-mail repstei3@optonline.net
#9793 Secretary #9389 Mark’Dizzy’Kaplan Sandy *** Harley’Hoppy’Pretty Ellen
50 Nutmeg Hill 15 Rita Lane
Hamden Ct.06514 Milford Ct. 06461
203-281-7970 cell 768-3373 203-877-8816 cell 508-3430
e-mail- mtrane1@aol.com e-mail -Hopytklown@cs.com
Treasurer Gary ‘Huggy’ Matican Sid ‘Poppy’ Levine #9225 35 Town House Rd. #9617
365-Mather St. unit 26 Hamden Ct. 06514
Hamden Ct. 06514 e-mail garymatican@yahoo.com
203-288-6221 fax 203-248-0800 cell 411-9733
Cell- 203-410-9348 home 397-2806
e-mail-sidneylevine@snet.net
Trustees #9634 Trustee 2009
Joel’ JoJo’ Snyder Maxine 2007 Don’Donzo’ Akin Carrie
82 Sillman Road 579 Orange Ave. #9960
Wallingford Ct.06492 Milford Ct. 06460
203-265-0746 203-878-2449
Cell- 203-530-9037 cell-668-2219
e-mail-Klownjo@hotmail.com e-mail-doncare@optonline.net
2ND V.P #9765 Honorary Member #7991
Michael’hankee’ Hankin ** * Ron’Ronnie’Schlank Iris
18 Pool Road trustee 2008 198 Timrod Road
North Haven Ct. 06473 Manchester Ct.06040
203-239-0042 cell 623-9637 860-643-4772
e-m e-mail-hankintheklown@sbcglobal.net e-mail-iris198@aol.com
Honarary Member #8211
***Frank ‘Dimples’ Chambrovivh Barbara *** Hy’Big Eyes’ Katz Karol
36 Village St. #70 Hemlock Ave.
Northford Ct.06472 New Haven Ct. 06515
203-484-9480 203-387-5488
e-mail- e-mail hyklown@comcast.net
Stanley Rosenberg #10109 Doug "Willie" Wilson #6330
Fiel 43 Fieldstone Court 155 elm st
North Haven Ct. 06473 Monroe Ct. 06468
203-239-0271 203-261-0181
e-mail- rosenbergstanley@sbcglobal.net e-mail-dougspainting@snet.net
Associate Member * #9636 Associate Member #9635
Tom ‘Fuzzy’Skibicki Mary *Barry’ Buttons’ Schacht
85 Ridgecrest Road 4 Davenport Raod
Wallingford Ct. 06492 Wallingford Ct. 06492
203-265-2263 203 265=0145
|
