The Ballad of Gypsy-Rose

Gypsy-Rose was abandoned as a baby - left on the doorstep of the local vicar Reverend John Smith. He and his wife Flo had longed for a child and saw her arrival as an answer to a prayer. They named her Mary Ann Smith. Ann after her ‘maternal’ grandmother – a fine upstanding woman, who played the organ in her local church.

Mary was a feisty baby, with a strong cry.

By the time she was 12, she was proving quite a handful for the poor Smiths.

At 14, she caused the Reverend John to go completely bald. Mrs Smith was completely white.

At 16, Mary ran away.

If the Smiths were totally honest (which of course they were not), they were somewhat relieved… and so was Mary, who changed her name by deed poll to Gypsy-Rose (no surname) and had run away to join a cruelty-free circus (no performing animals).

There she found a newborn kitten, abandoned under a rose bush in the garden of a derelict house, right near the Big Top.  She named her Rose, completely forgetting the reference to her own new name. They were constant companions and each other’s only family. 

Gypsy-Rose would have liked to have cut all ties with the strict Smith family. However, feeling guilty, because, after all, they did give her a home, she wrote them a letter to thank them. She told them that she had a good job working as a secretary. Had newly married and was enjoying the simple life. She asked them to forgive her for going off like that, but that she believed it best that they had no more contact. She signed it Mrs Mary Brown and sent it to them from a respectable town that the circus was passing through.

She thought that would be that, until one day she spotted them while she was performing in a little town not far from the Smiths’ home. It was quite a shock. After the show, the elderly Mrs Smith made a point of introducing herself to Gypsy-Rose; complimenting her on her fine skills, and explaining that they had been given free tickets to the circus by a kind parishioner. 

She told the trapeze artist that this was her first visit since a child, and that, well, she said with a giggle, it had reminded her of her childhood dream to run away to join the circus.

Morals of the story:

Never put anyone in a box.

Life can be surprising.

You may bury your dreams, but others just might subconsciously absorb them. Now that could be a good or a scary thing. Or just a thing. And anyway…what the heck are you doing burying them? 

Asta Lander (astascolourfulworld@gmail.com, www.astalander.com.au, Instagram - @asta_lander)

Gypsy-Rose - available for adoption at the East End Gallery

Asta Lander - artist, animal lover, activist and Gypsy-Rose's creator.