I'm one of those people who cannot remember a truly happy Halloween.
Something always spoiled the fun when I was young. If it wasn't costume hassles, it was mean comments from the kids who made it their solemn duty to belittle anyone with a modicum of creativity. Or it was the problem of finding the perfect friend with whom to trick or treat.
Once I became a parent, I thought I would have the pleasure of standing back and watching my children enjoy Halloween. Wrong. Babies want nothing to do with those cute, hot costumes that moms spend hours creating or seeking out. Toddlers end up being frightened by ghastly looking big kids, tripping down steps while trick or treating or overdosing on candy. When children are old enough to go to school, costume envy spoils everything. I wonder how many parents would agree when I say that Halloween is nothing but a huge letdown?
Last year, things were falling into place so well, I got sucked into hoping for a perfect Halloween. Costumes worked out easily for once thanks to a burst of creativity from my daughters, aged 14, 12 and 8. Trick or treating dates were set three days in advance. Not a single bump in the road.
When I got up that fateful morning, I danced through the house waking my girls. “It's Halloween! The day you've been waiting for!” Great start, with a fair bit of excitement.
When my smiling rock star and Queen of Hearts appeared in short order, the last thing I expected was a semi coming over the hill. My youngest arrived in the kitchen in tears, a mother's worst nightmare on Halloween morning. “Everyone else is being a person. I don't want to be a laundry basket!” she said through sobs.
I was stunned. Up to that moment, my youngest daughter's self-made costume had been nothing but a source of pride and joy for her. She came up with the idea all by herself early in September. We cut a hole in an old laundry basket at the beginning of October, padding the edges of the hole with an old blanket. All that remained was for my child to put on her fleece robe, pull the basket up past her waist and fill it with clothing from her dresser. A few socks and towels pinned to the hood of the robe around her face gave her a distinctive laundry look, and we gleefully gave each other a high-five. It was a stroke of genius, we thought.
But everything crashed to a halt at a friend's Halloween party the day before. My youngest played with a bunch of girls who were store-bought princesses and fairies. One of them decided they should rate each other's costumes, and she gave my-daughter-the-laundry-basket a “bad mark.” I didn't hear a word about it until Halloween morning, after it had worked on my laundry basket's psyche through the night.
Convincing the tearful child to eat some toast, I conjured up last-minute costume possibilities from our closets and the dress-up box. Blue-haired hippie girl? Bride? Gypsy? Pirate? Scarecrow? All refused, tears still streaming. “I'm not going to school today!”
So I changed my tactic, fighting fire with fire. “The girl who gave you a bad mark – I'll bet she bought her costume without even thinking.” (I can be cattier than an eight-year-old dressed as a princess.) “But you came up with a very original and creative idea. Maybe she's just jealous she didn't think of it herself.” (Probably not, but worth a try.) “And if you go to school wearing something else, then she'll know you think your idea wasn't very good, and you'll be just like everybody else.” (Go, Mom! Appeal to that sense of originality, and throw in a wee guilt trip while you're at it.)
See why I hate Halloween with a passion? It invites unfavourable comparisons, stresses out parents and launches six-month sugar and caffeine highs (Halloween candy segues into chocolate Santas segues into chocolate hearts segues into chocolate Easter bunnies). I had hoped this might be my first ever happy Halloween after having been through similar stresses every year with a different daughter, but I was sideswiped by costume misery yet again.
Fortunately, my little laundry basket decided to stick with her original plan. On our way to the school bus, I told her I was proud of her creativity one more time for good measure.
A half hour later, my teenager phoned from school. “Mom, I forgot half of my Halloween costume at home.”
“What did you forget?”
“Those glove things I bought at Value Village.”
“Half your costume? I thought you were being a rock star, not Lady Godiva! I'll bring them at lunchtime when I come to help your little sister into her laundry basket costume.”
“But I don't know where the glove things are. Do you think I should just go without them?”
“Yes!”
Minutes later, the phone rang again. “I remembered where they are.”
Everything worked out for my rock star and my Queen of Hearts. When my youngest got home, she was bright-eyed and proud. Everyone who counted told her she was a brilliant and creative little laundry basket. Trick or treating went smoothly enough, and we survived another Halloween.
Maybe this year will be perfect.
Maria Kruszewski lives in Edmonton.
Illustration by Vicki Nerino.
