When Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus announced on Saturday that it would be folding after 146 years, I was surprised that I was upset.

Since I was a kid I’ve had a complicated relationship with the Greatest Show on Earth. It was the biggest and best-known circus in the United States, long before Cirque du Soleil had entered our collective consciousness. Also, Ringling was always what my family wasn’t.

My parents founded the Pickle Family Circus in San Francisco in the 1970s in opposition to circuses like Ringling. To this day, many circuses still model themselves after what my family was doing, whether they know it or not.

So why do I feel such a loss?

Link to Full Article on the Los Angeles Times.