I really need to be something normal for Halloween next year.
Generally, I wear a conglomeration of items I already own and declare that I am something recognizable even if my costume is at best a mere semblance of its object. For example, I was Mystique once, and pieced together a blue-green-black set of items that were more or less tight. Another time, I was God-on-the-seventh-day, which mostly involved looking bedraggled and wearing a sign around my neck that said, “Be still and know that I am God.” I have also been a bag lady.
This year I was Saturn. It was cool because I got four hula-hoops and connected them by pinning them together at various distances using rainbow leg warmers and a pink feather boa and a bright scarf. Underneath the hula-hoops I wore a blue sequined thing that was mostly a bra with sleeves, and a high-waisted black skirt.
My friend Richard asked what my breasts had to do with being Saturn, and I said he should focus his attention on the rings, and anyway, it’s Halloween, I’m supposed to be sexy, right? Sexy Saturn?
Halloween is an appropriate opportunity to demonstrate that, contrary to popular opinion, I am physically capable of cleavage. So, whatever Richard – breasts might be an important addition to Saturn costumes in general. Or maybe not. Costumes are allowed to stretch rules and definitions, but I might possibly be guilty of taking stretching to a new level of pulling, twisting and reforming (occasionally).
Which is why I am writing to say that I want to be normal next year, predictable and recognizable.
I am tired of practicing creativity and frugality and then being forced to explain and re-explain.
I just want to be a ghost next year, and cut a head hole in a sheet (otherwise it’s too KKK-like), and arm holes (because I can’t go for the entire length of any party without eating – I munch like a cow – even if I’m just popping through). As a precaution I might write GHOST in large block letters on the back of my sheet, so that people will know what I am, even at a distance. I will also wear white lipstick. It will be perfect.
And then, over the next couple of years, I will watch for costume suits at thrift stores that are not open to interpretation and simultaneously appropriate for cold weather. I will find a bear or dinosaur or ape suit, even though I would rather be a hummingbird, and in order to make the purchase worthwhile, I will wear it as pajamas during the winter months. This will serve triply because if someone tries to break into my house/room/apartment, I will just stand up from my bed and they will think they are about to be attacked by a small bear or dinosaur. Or an ape.
(Honestly, I would be frightened if the dark shape of a chimpanzee or orangutan rose from a bed where I expected there to be an average-sized girl. Bring it, thieves; I’ve got your number.)
Like I said, I just want to be normal on Halloween.
