Why I Hate Halloween
Not the candy - it's great. Just everything else.
When I was three my mom sewed me a clown costume for Halloween. She didn’t really sew - her sewing machine was mostly just used as handy ballast when I was building a blanket fort - so this was more noteworthy than I knew at the time. So I was a clown that year for Halloween. And the next year. And the couple of years after that.
Here’s the thing, though - kids grow. And I was a kid. But mom had exerted her maximum amount of effort on creating the clown costume already, so there were no adjustments to be made. So, I eventually became a clown who was exceptionally prepared for a flood - and who was wearing a suit so tight you could tell if he was circumsised.
Putting my foot down on the clown front led into the sorriest era in Halloween history. The house coat. The first year - grade 2 - I went to school as a boxer. I didn’t have gloves, mind you. Or boxing shoes. Or boxing shorts. Or anything to indicate that I was a boxer. I just wore regular shorts and a bath robe, and told everyone I was a boxer. I did not win the costume parade that year.
In grade 3 the story was that I was a pirate who had just gotten up and was about to start getting ready for work. I had absolutely nothing that would indicate I was a pirate. I was just an asshole wearing a bathrobe over his clothes telling a dumb story. The peg leg, the sword and the parrot must have been just off stage, I guess.
In grade 4 I wore a tan shirt and tan shorts, and pretended that I was naked under the bathrobe. Nothing freakish about being dressed as a creepy flasher in an elementary school. I didn’t win the costume parade that year, either.
I mercifully wasn’t at school for Halloween in Grade 5. The bath robe got a rest. But it was back the next year. I stuffed a plastic bag full of wadded up paper, and carried it around with me. I was a guy who had just woken up and was carrying his garbage to the curb. Jesus.
None of those costumes were my idea. Mom came up with them. All on the evening of October 30th. And every year I just prayed with all of my heart that it was cold enough for trick or treating that we had to wear winter clothes, and I could just pretend that I had my costume on underneath.
My mom was, in many ways, a saint. But even the best of us leave dark legacies behind when they leave. It’s not hard to figure out why I hate costumes.
Happy Halloween to everyone. Except for mom.