The trapezist in our midst.

October 20, Pleasant Hill.

Tavana Luvas is the one who adds those quirky quotes and notes to the bottom of our morning routes. She works in the office, but her heart is in the big top.
She was a flying trapeze artist all her life. She made her debut at 16 after having performed a variety of other acts, alone or with her younger sister, since she was nine years old. "I used to be somebody," she said.
All through her career her mother kept trying to get her to tour Europe with big name circuses but she would get pregnant every time a contract was at hand. Tavana had three boys and a girl, Arwen, whose birthday we celebrated yesterday, but none of her grown children has gone on to a circus career. "They just never showed an interest in it," she said. She cannot remember ever thinking about her interests either but did what she was told to do and so was taught circus acts by her grandmother, who was "the teacher in the family."
Her grandmother had come over from Germany and made up the name Luvas after a movie star of the time. Tavana is the fourth generation of circus performer in her family, and it looks like she might be the last of the bohemians.

Le Brone and Tavana in the Kelly Miller Circus office.