As the days of October fly by, my least favorite holiday of the year looms closer and closer on the calendar. The air gets colder, the leaves change colors, decorative bats and spiders appear on storefront windows, and massive amounts of pumpkins pop up everywhere. All of that is fine and dandy, but what actually happens on October 31st gives me the creeps.
Don’t get me wrong, I like eating candy corn and drinking pumpkin spice lattes. I love watching ‘Hocus Pocus’ and ‘Halloweentown,’ and I’m more than happy to pet a few black cats, but I would rather have my toenails pulled out then walk into a haunted house. I just can’t wrap my mind around why people like being scared.
On a normal night, my heart beats on overtime when I hear a creak in my ceiling. If I’m home alone, I’m tempted to sleep with at least a butter knife under my pillow. On numerous occasions I’ve been convinced people are following me home, only to find out that they actually live in the same building as me. I’ve only seen a handful of horror movies in my life and I’ve ended up crying during every single one of them. Maybe I’m a huge scaredy-cat, but Halloween combines all of my least favorite things into one night of sheer terror.
Imagine then how I feel when I turn around at the bar or am walking down the street and see people with blood covering them head to toe, fake cuts and bruises covering their faces. I hate the red contacts and the plastic teeth, the makeup that makes you look like your face is unzipping, or the screws coming out of your cheeks and forehead. All of the prosthetics and layers of face paint make me feeling like I’m stuck inside of an episode of “The Walking Dead.”
When preparing my half ass costume for Halloween 2016, I’ve simply realized that not only do I not like others dressing up, I don’t like to dress up myself. I would rather just dress like me. There’s always the argument that “it’s fun” or “it’s just one night,” but I just don’t see the allure or frankly, the point. I don’t have the look for the sexy nurse or police officer costumes, I’m grossed out by the gory costumes, and creative food or celebrity costumes from Pinterest end up looking horrendous in real life. Instead of wearing normal clothes and being asked ‘what are you?’ all night and having to tell people ‘I’M JUST ME!’ I’ll break out my go-to minnie mouse ears and some white winter gloves and go as my favorite cheese eating Disney icon.
Now that I think about it, I really never liked Halloween; even when I was a kid I just I went along with it because it’s one of those things you just do. When I was little I usually dressed up as some character or animal I was into, just to go out and get free candy. I would get excited about dressing up as something, until it actually came time to putting the costume on and then it was game over. The makeup would start to harden on my face and cause a very serious nose itch, the costume would start to rub me the wrong way and make me sweat. It would then all come off in a burst of sugar-induced rage. The whole ensemble would last, at most, two hours before I was back in my pajamas counting my candy haul.
In High School it was always the cool thing to dress in a theme costume with your friends. In theory this should make it so if you’re going to look completely ridiculous at least you can look ridiculous as a group. My costumes ranging from ‘lax bros’ to biker chicks to minions, all equally embarrassing ideas.I thought it was a great idea until I had the outfit on and realized I looked ridiculous. To this day, I look back on Facebook to those pictures and cringe.
In my normal non-halloween life, I love being ridiculous; I find it very hard to take anything seriously, especially myself. Saying and doing embarrassing or silly things are trademark Julia things. There’s just something that happens to my ego when I’m expected to be someone else other than just me; my confidence somehow disappears.
I can appreciate the artistry and time that goes into something more creative and elaborate like making yourself into a gum ball machine or dressing as thunder and lightning. However, I can’t hide my annoyance at most of the ‘sexy’ costumes. Some things just shouldn’t be sexy, like french fries or a table. I highly doubt that the creators of Barney and Sesame Street ever envisioned their characters being used as costumes for sorority girls to show some skin.
In college I feel like Halloween is an excuse to get drunk and make out with a dude in a fuzzy chewbacca suit or a girl dressed as blue haired Harley Quinn. This year, however, will be my last Halloween as a college student, so might as well suck it up and fall in with the crowd. With only six short months left in college, a time categorized for recklessness and belligerent fun, I’ll drag myself off Netflix and out to the bars and parties. I know if I don’t go, I’ll wish I had when I’m at home alone scrolling through Snapchat and Instagram getting a serious case of FOMO. I’ll go and shake hands with the mummies, take a shot with Spiderman, or share a basket of fries with a hot dog, but as soon as someone with a fake knife sticking out of their head comes my way, I’m done.
Illo: Alex Gilbeaux
Julia is the current Senior Photo Editor for the Free Press. She is in her senior year at Parsons, majoring in Photography and minoring in Art History. Julia is originally from Boston and is patiently awaiting her return there after college. She is a wiener dog and pizza enthusiast and finds herself most at home when she is near the ocean.
