Ever heard of that term? Most of us including my best friend don’t know that coulrophobia is the fear of clowns. Last week, my godson, my best friend’s son, celebrated his 10th birthday. Our boy was promised a party with his schoolmates. His mother hired party entertainers in Boston to give the kid the best first and last Happy 10th Birthday celebration.

Since she was thinking of her son’s well-being, she chose among corporate event entertainers which included a funny clown in Boston, MA. She seemed to forget the one thing – the welfare of her husband.

My friend had it since childhood. He can’t remember where he got his clown phobia but one thing is for real. He would be so freaking afraid of a clown in Boston on the happiest day of his son!

There’s no refund and a down payment was made. So how will he, or we, prepare for the worst? My best man turned to me since the recession is keeping him away from therapies. I’ve done some "research" here and there but all I got was a bunch of rhetoric shout outs.

So I’ve decided to do things my way. It better be very soon or else the father won’t hold the cake for his handsome boy to blow out. That would be very un-father-ful, I thought. So I threw a smile and my best friend got very afraid. Maybe he saw the evil serial killer clown, Boston has never seen and he’s standing in front of him.

I told him to come with me for a short ride. We hopped on my humble truck and drive off the nearest amusement park. Please note that when I say amusement park, I’m using kind words for a circus.

I drive until we reached the very inside of the circus. To me, he won’t escape but for him, he reached the point of no return. Nice attitude, I would say. Everything was okay until a clown passed us by. The flour-dipped face guy just passed by and my man was both furious and afraid. I never thought people who have coulrophobia or any other type of phobia would overreact that way.

No turning back for me, though. I politely dragged him inside a tent where clowns were roaming the audience seats. I exposed him to these fine gentlemen according to me and demons in costumes as referred by my friend.

I’m a believer of Pavlov. You know that guy who was well-known in psychology because of his famous Conditioning Approach. I’m a bit dogmatic and extremist, however. I firmly deem that every damn thing in this world is learned. Therefore, everything can be learned to unlearn. That’s the theory behind me marinating my friend with the people he feared.

What’s astonishing? His ex-girlfriend was one of those clowns. He said her hello to my friend and to yours truly. She then called her husband who was also a clown that day. According to Ms. Ex, they volunteered for a cause that day to the people who have depressions.

Phobia I not depression but it was a nice approach I thought. Then they talked all-day while I was checking out another girl in clown costume. That aside, my friend’s fear of clowns decreased a bit, definitely not totally.

That helped a lot and the birthday bash was a success. Funny, the clown who was hired was our professor in college.

Glad that we happily celebrated the occasion although I know a phobia is something to be overcame with commitment and time. I don’t know if it’s my therapy or the sudden effect of a past relationship or a professor in college.