{"id":2462,"date":"2023-05-22T13:36:14","date_gmt":"2023-05-22T13:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/?p=2462"},"modified":"2026-05-26T01:16:48","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T01:16:48","slug":"love-always-mom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/2023\/05\/22\/love-always-mom\/","title":{"rendered":"My Name is Spring-A-Doodle"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">My Name is Spring-A-Doodle<\/h1>\n\n\n<div style=\"font-style:normal;font-weight:300;\" class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-post-author-name\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mattieneretin.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"wp-block-post-author-name__link\">Mattie Neretin<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"height:40px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"padding:56.25% 0 0 0;position:relative;\"><iframe src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/819527393?h=78d6c97046&amp;badge=0&amp;autopause=0&amp;player_id=0&amp;app_id=58479\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\" title=\"My Name is Spring-A-Doodle\"><\/iframe><\/div><script src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/api\/player.js\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:80px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-1 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>\u201cClowning saves my soul,\u201d says Donna Gutowski. When she works as a clown, Donna goes by the alias \u201cSpring-A-Doodle\u201d and is part of the Grease Paint Alley Clowns, a group made up mostly of women in their late 60s and 70s. The group appears at local events for children and elderly adults around Western New York where they paint the children\u2019s faces, make balloon animals, and perform magic tricks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cHalf of your social life goes away when you lose your spouse\u2026 no one means to, but nobody really keeps in touch,\u201d Donna says. She became a clown after Maureen, the daughter of one of her patients, told her about their group. \u201cI always wanted to be a clown, ever since I was 19,\u201d she says, but she had to wait until her children were grown to see her dream fulfilled.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Donna\u2019s day job is to work as a caretaker for Amiel Mokhiber Sr., who is in the late stages of Alzheimer&#8217;s Disease. In caring for him, she cooks, grooms, entertains, engages with, and tries to keep him calm during six to twelve hours shifts two to three days a week. She is part of a team of six women who rotate through Amiel\u2019s life as part of his Medicare team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Through her twelve-year journey as a clown, Donna has come to rethink her role as a caretaker. Using clowning to bring joy to children in her community, she approaches clowning as another way that she can be a caretaker, on a larger scale. Becoming a caretaker for the elderly was another step in her journey.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1400\" height=\"901\" src=\"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-1400x901.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2480\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-1400x901.jpg 1400w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-910x585.jpg 910w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-1024x659.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-768x494.jpg 768w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-1536x988.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-100x64.jpg 100w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-1484x955.jpg 1484w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair-900x579.jpg 900w, https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wheelchair.jpg 1974w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1400px) 100vw, 1400px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Donna Gutowski pushes Amiel Mokhiber in his wheelchair back to his home after taking him out for a dinner. Donna has been the primary caregiver for Amiel who has Alzheimer&#8217;s Disease.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When she works as a clown, Donna goes by the alias \u201cSpring-A-Doodle\u201d and is part of the Grease Paint Alley Clowns, a group made up mostly of women in their late 60s and 70s. Donna\u2019s day job is to work as a caretaker for Amiel Mokhiber Sr., who is in the late stages of Alzheimer&#8217;s Disease.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2223,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"Donna Gutowski kisses the forehead of Amiel Mokhiber, Sr, whom she cares for as he ages with Alzheimer's Disease.","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[328,338],"tags":[364,100,366,365,28,363,351,43],"class_list":["post-2462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-328","category-video","tag-aging","tag-alzheimers","tag-caregiving","tag-clowns","tag-family","tag-mattie-neretin","tag-parenting","tag-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2462"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2462\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2537,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2462\/revisions\/2537"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/capstone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}