Halloween

I’m into it. When the kids were little, I dressed them up in home-made costumes. One year, Melanie was a Geisha, several years, a princess of some sort, a pilgrim. David was a clown, a bumblebee, and once, the wolfman. I cut up a wig and glued the hair to his hands and face. He hated it.

I remember the time Melanie objected to a home-made costume so I bought her one. She came back from begging all upset because everyone on the street had the same outfit. She never complained again. As a matter of fact, she still has me make costumes for her. A few years ago, I made a fortune tellers’ outfit for David.

It must be hereditary.

I never pass up the chance to get into dress-up. Anthem Authors, my writer’s club, has a pot-luck Halloween party every year. Costumes are optional, but there’s no way I’d miss out on a stellar opportunity to become someone else.

Last year, I came as Bugsy Segal, a tribute to Las Vegas. On Dollar Day, I got a new-with-tags, Ralph Lauren, pinstriped suit from the men’s department at Goodwill. Since Vegas was quite warm that day, I had to take off the jacket and the big fedora half-way through the party. So, not a total success. I gave the suit back to Goodwill a few days later.

One year, I came as Cher. I gathered together the components for the costume she wore on the battleship when she did the video for “I Believe in Life After Love.” Shocking! I did do a more modest version. I had the big, curly black wig, but it was a size too small and kept slipping back and revealing my blonde temples. (I use the term “blonde” loosely these days.) When I was a kid, family members used to say of an egoist, “She got the big-head.” I must be a victim of that. My head is too big for some women’s hats. Men’s hats come in sizes, but women’s usually don’t. As a born and bred feminist, I object! At any rate, my Cher couldn’t sing, but my legs are holding up well, and the costume was a big hit, if not a total success. I still wear the black leather motorcycle jacket. I’m cool.

My Pierrot the Clown costume was successful when I made and wore one back in the eighties. I passed it on to another family member, but remembered it so fondly, I made another a few years ago. Can’t go wrong with black and white. See–the great thing about a clown costume is—you can be as big or as small as you need to be and it will always fit.

This year, I was a somewhat scary flapper. I gave up wearing pantyhose several years ago, but the flapper accessory-pack I bought from Amazon came with fishnets. The true horror of the day was me trying to get into them.

I also tried to put a Marcelle wave in my hair, and it looked great for about an hour. I evidently didn’t use enough hairspray to hold it for the evening, so half-way through the party, I looked more like Fay Wray at the end of King Kong than Marion Davies in Yolanda. So, again–not a total success.

I tried to make those straight-line, black eyebrows that were popular in the twenties, but I didn’t have a black eyebrow pencil. I used my eyeliner stick and as the evening went on, it feathered out, so by the time the party got into swing, I looked like Boris Karloff in a dress.

At any rate, I spent the evening with good friends, ate a pile of chicken, cornbread/corn casserole, and potatoes au gratin and brought home a lot of leftovers. Good times.

This is a photo of the year I went as a newsboy—guess why that one didn’t work out.