Juggling family life, clowning for circus

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It's two hours before another performance of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey's 133rd edition of the Greatest Show on Earth, and a cloud of white powder surrounds Bello Nock's face.

Mr. Nock, who is known as Bello the Clown with a signature 8 inches of red hair that stands straight up, slaps on additional layers of stage makeup. He adds a streak of blue eyeliner, blush to his cheeks and the tip of his nose, thick lines to his eyebrows and pink to his lips.

On March 25 at the MCI Center, the Greatest Show on Earth is holding its first night in the Washington area.

Mr. Nock's two daughters, Amariah, 10, and Annaliese, 6, sit side by side as they do their schoolwork in a makeshift dressing room. His son, Alex, 14, plays on the computer. The week before, the family was in a similar dressing room in Baltimore, and in mid-April they will be in another one in Charleston, W.Va.

That's life and school on the road for the Nock family.

"It's tough, but life is what you make of it," says Mr. Nock, who is 35 and a native of Sarasota, Fla. "Every week is a different city, but you have to make it home."

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Mr. Nock and his wife of nearly 15 years, Jennifer, travel an average of 48 weeks a year as part of the Red Unit, one of two units touring for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey with 98 performers and another 177 staff and crew.

The Nocks drive separately from the 56-car train that transports most of the Red Unit performers. Those who have an animal act or families can choose to travel separately in their own motor homes, a total of about 10 to 15 families and performers. The Nocks take a 78-foot RV and a semi-truck of circus equipment, leaving behind their central Florida home for most of the year, where Mr. Nock has "a playground of circus toys."