It’s Halloween! Do you like getting dressed up in strange or goofy costumes? Do you enjoy answering the door over and over and handing out sugar rushes to little princesses and ghouls? What nefarious ideas come to mind on a dark cold evening with candles flickering in gourds and fake blood dripping off of ax blades? Have you ever tricked instead of treated?
Wikipedia tells us that the roots of the holiday are in pagan customs and Celtic Samhain. Entering in to the dark part of the year was seen as a liminal time, when the spirits or fairies (the Aos Sí) could more easily come into our world and were particularly active.
Edith: I’ll start off here. I LOVE Halloween. I adore getting dressed up in a
costume of any kind. I don’t have little kids of my own anymore, or grandchildren yet, and it’s so fun to see what tiny costumes are popular this year and to drop candy into orange plastic pumpkins or the pillowcases of early teens. These days I’ve been getting my costume fix by dressing up in the theme of the New England Crime Bake banquet, which last year was “Femme Fatales and Ladykillers.” LIz and I went as sluts fatales…
Jessie: My favorite part of Halloween is the parties. I am a total sucker for themed food and I love to construct silly or creepy cupcakes and cream puffs. I like elegantly frightful decorations. I adore Jack-o- lanterns. Eating doughnuts off strings plucks at my heartstrings. I love construction paper bats and lollipop and tissue ghosts. Most years I make a chocolatey truffle cake shaped like a bat whether there is a party or not. Even after the kids are too old to trick or treat they still love the bat cake!
Sherry: I love getting dressed up too! It’s fun to shop for costumes at places like Goodwill or thrift shops. In this very old picture of me I’m wearing a 50s dress I paid $2.00 for at the Salvation Army. I also like passing out candy and seeing all the little kids with their glowing cheeks. Happy Halloween!
Barb: Okay. My turn. I HATE halloween. I hate costumes, I hate trick or treating. I hate that the leaves are down and the time will soon be changing. I’m okay with pumpkin-carving, Indian corn on the front door and gourds. But that’s as far as you’ll get me to go. I readily admit that when my husband isn’t home, I turn off all the lights and hide in the house.
Okay, I don’t hate the photo above. How could you? But that’s as far as you’ll get me to go.
Julie: I like Halloween. I had a work party/benefit yesterday, and dressed up as an arts super hero. It was very fun, though I suspect the pink is going to stay in my hair a while. And I have really fond memories of going trick or treating with my father when we were little. It isn’t my favorite holiday, but it is right up there.
Liz: Halloween is my absolute favorite holiday. The more haunted houses, ghouls and scares the better. I’m a Salem, Mass. girl and I love spending October days and nights there soaking up the vibe of ghosts past. Finding new scary places to visit is my other pastime – last year I discovered the Dark Manor haunted house here in Connecticut and I have to say, it rocks! Plus, I love candy 🙂
Readers: Love Halloween or hate it? Favorite costume? Favorite candy?
Thanks for the flashbacks to various Halloweens ladies. One of my earliest memories is when I was 4 or 5 and still the youngest of 6 kids (it was 7 of us shortly after, then 8). My uncle had lived in Japan during post WWII reconstruction and given each of us a Japanese kimono (that is the plural form) with obi (sash tied in back). We had great fun on Halloween, dressed in those and walking from house to house, which was quite a trek in the country as the houses were far apart. My brother, the oldest and an Eagle Scout, carried a carved pumpkin with candle inside to light the way. I remember him standing in the roadway until we had all safely crossed, eery pumpkin glowing brightly.
These days, I don’t do much of a costume, but since we are participating in the Chamber of Commerce’s Halloween Trick-or-Treat for kids, I’ll wear my Looney Tunes Halloween tie and loop some small skeleton heads around my neck for fun. My friend Ed, a really big guy, dresses up each year in a SpongeBob Squarepants costume and he plans to drop by the Cyber Cafe to join us. It will be fun.
By the way, the best costume I’ve seen in years of doing this is the kid who came dressed as a toilet. It was a great costume!
What a vivid scene, Claire, of your brother carrying the lit jack o’lantern!
Julie and Sherry, I love your costumes! And the grandbaby’s, too, of course.