Halloween has always been my favorite holiday.
When I was a little girl, my Halloween preparations started the day school let out in June. Yes, it took me four and a half months to get ready for the wonderfulness that is Halloween. It was very serious business. After all, Halloween only came once a year and I had to be ready when it arrived.
Halloween was to me what Christmas is to almost every other child in America. I was more concerned about who I was going to be on October 31st than what I was going to get when Santa came to town. Who cares if I was naughty or nice if I didn’t have a good costume!
So every year when school let out, I started plotting and planning my costume. Would I be a witch? Would I be a character from a book? Would I be the popular Halloween costume that every other suburban kid was that year? These were life altering questions.
I wasn’t the type of kid who could decide a week before that I wanted to be a witch. I was the type of kid who had to have the costume started in August in order to be a witch because I needed ample time to develop my back story. Why was I carrying a cauldron? Did I rely on my broomstick to get around? Was I good witch or a bad witch? What kind of spells would I be casting?
Yes, that’s right. I had a back story for being a witch when I was four years old. I made every person in my family refer to me as “Acorn the Witch”. And I was a good witch. Kind of like “Dorrie the Witch” but since I was already Dorie, I couldn’t be “Dorrie”. All of this drove my poor uncle (the single, childless adult) absolutely batty. He couldn’t figure out why I didn’t just get in my costume and get my candy like every other kid.
When I say Halloween was a really big deal, I might actually be understating its monumental importance in my life.
On this side of adulthood, Halloween is weird. Sure its fun to dress up and go out with my friends to a party but it isn’t the same. And it has nothing to do with the candy.
It has everything to do with perspective.
As adult Dorie in a Halloween costume, I’m Dorie as a witch. Or I’m Dorie as Peter Pan. Or I’m Dorie as the random stuff the kids gave me through out the year (Halloween 2006 I decorated myself with all of the stuff my nieces and nephew gave me and walked around the neighborhood with a tutu on my head). I’m still Dorie.
But child Dorie in a Halloween costume was amazing. It wasn’t Dorie as a witch but it was “Acorn the Witch”. The year I dressed up as a flight attendant, I memorized my mom’s emergency speech from her days as a flight attendant. When I dressed up as a pirate, for that one special day, I really was a pirate. I embraced what I imagined.
Halloween became the chance for me to try out different aspects of my personality without fear that they wouldn’t fit in my life. For one day, I could shed my life and try on something different.
I think that’s something all kids need. One day where they can explore different sides of themselves without fear of rejection or judgment or failure. One day where they can embrace the fabulousness that their minds create.
Halloween is really just a giant celebration of creativity and fantasy. The adult versions of us just forget it.
Carmella said...
1I had an amazing time with you girls on Halloween- dressed in what was probably my silliest costume ever. Only you guys make me feel that comfortable with myself.
11/3/08 10:32 AM | Comment Link
Dorie said...
2@Carmella – Um, that was an amazing costume. I was so jealous of your makeup application too. You were a walking celebration of creativity and fantasy.
11/5/08 11:39 AM | Comment Link