BOO!!
Oops, sorry if I scared you but, in case you haven’t heard, Halloween is here at last. The Great Pumpkin Day, when I finally decide if I’ll dress up our dog (who has the ferociously scary name, “Puddin’ “) as George Bush or FiFi the French chambermaid. After observing a surfeit of Internet photos of canines outfitted as Little Red Riding Hood, Eleanor Roosevelt, alligators and bananas, no less, I figured our dog would be deeply impressed by my decision to clothe him in more sophisticated Halloween canine couture. Well, OK, to be honest, getting Puddin’ to sit still long enough to gussy him up for Halloween would require some pretty heavy medication. For him and me both.
Call me thrill-challenged, but ever since my daughters grew up and left home, I’ve felt a little underappreciated at Halloween; hence this preoccupation with choosing a costume for the dog. Sure, there are other fun traditions associated with Halloween, and each year I still pick up a couple of pumpkins, haul them home and display them on the front porch, sans scary faces, but somehow it just isn’t the same. Inexplicably, I find myself missing the gooshy, stringy mess and slimy, orange fingers, which, come to think of it, is a pretty nifty idea for a costume – but were, rather, the by-products of the annual carving of the pumpkin. But of all the traditions, it was the selection of the annual Halloween costumes that always sent me straight over the top.
In my early years as the mom of two elementary school age – and Halloween-costume-impaired – daughters, the first of October found me in the fabric store hunched over massive pattern books featuring creative (i.e. “complicated”) examples of princesses, fairies, ballerinas and a plethora of other feminine costumes that could be whipped up at home. If I could sew.
I know what you are thinking: “You can’t sew? Any idiot can sew!” Well, of course, I can “sew” if you call straight lines “sewing,” but there is an unfortunate dearth of Halloween costumes, not to mention other clothing-type items that are constructed by sewing straight seams exclusively. Tablecloths, bedspreads, simple curtains are a snap. But when an item essentially needs to correspond to the dimensions of the person who plans to wear it, the garments I produce typically feature a little extra, um … elbow room.
One fortunate Halloween I managed to find a couple of costume patterns that weren’t too picky in terms of actually fitting the model. And, after what I consider to be the barest minimum of blatant maternal prodding, Daughter Number One decided she would be thrilled to be a clown for Halloween. I whipped up her costume, and I’m happy to report she was the baggiest clown on the school grounds that year. Daughter Number Two (still too young to vocalize her complaints too loudly and therefore amenable to whatever I slipped over her head) was a bright red flower because I discovered that flower costumes consist of a few semi-straight seams and, like clown costumes, aren’t required to fit too well, either. Or to fit at all for that matter, because any fool knows a few safely pins and some duct tape can work miracles at Halloween.
So while the early days of motherhood demanded that we unfortunate, beleaguered moms turn out inspired Halloween costumes in order to escape the dreaded Halloween Hall of Shame, the pubescent conspiracy known as “Buying the Most Expensive Yet Tawdry Costume that Your Parents Cannot Afford,” eventually sent my adolescent daughters to the mall and the Halloween costume retail racks.
There in gaudy magnificence were that year’s offerings for traditional and pop culture Halloween icons. Barbies, princesses and cheerleaders, angels and Tinker Bell nestled alongside a glut of ghosts, skeletons and boys’ action figure heroes: Batman, Ninjas, Spiderman, and Rambo – compellingly geared for combat with a toy AK-47 and pith helmet.
Eventually, my daughters grew tired of the usual offerings at the department store and came back around to more creative identities for Halloween. It was a great year when our older daughter teamed up with her best friend to be “Salt,” coinciding with her friend’s “Pepper” costume. All-white clothing and a tin-foil covered derby was a challenge I could live with.
Taking a cue from her sister, our younger daughter chose a Grandma mask that suited her quirky sense of humor. “Grandma” came complete with profusely-sagging jowls and iron-grey hair done up in a bun of sorts, sending my offspring to my closet for a dowdy brown corduroy skirt, white lacy blouse, loafers and knee high stockings that she rolled down around her ankles. I didn’t want to spoil her fun by mentioning she had pretty much missed the mark on “Grandma” but bore a striking resemblance to the matriarch of the Gambino crime family. I mean – what the heck – it was Halloween.
But all good things must end, and soon my daughters were off to college and more, um … adult type costumes.
“I can see your navel!” I hollered at our older daughter when she modeled her costume prior to escaping her boring parents for a co-ed Halloween party. OK, so it was a fairly tame genie costume, not a pole dancer get-up per se, but whatever happened to those cute little ladybug and butterfly costumes?
“Did you remember your mittens?” I called to her retreating back as she sailed out the door with her friends in tow. I’ll spare you the description of the withering look she shot back to me.
So I think I’ll see how Puddin’ takes to his FiFi the French chambermaid costume and call it a day. On second thought, he’ll probably never agree to those fishnet stockings.
Gale Hammond is a 23-year Morgan Hill resident. Reach her at
Ga*********@ao*.com
.
