halloween hater

The little lady and I decided to watch The Devil Wears Prada (I'm strangely OK with this movie) the other night. About half-way through the movie, she offered to get me a slice of the rockin' good apple pie she had made on Saturday night. I was also in the mood for my current liquid obsession, Hawaiian Punch, and realizing that its sugary goodness would not mix well with apple pie, I decided to get up and get some. I was standing by the refrigerator with the bottle in my mouth when Becca swung the refrigerator door open and hit the bottle. This resulted in Hawaiian Punch getting all over my shirt and the floor, and in both my lips being split. As tasty as the mix of blood and liquid crack was in my mouth, I was quite upset. Rather than KO my wife with an uppercut to the chin, I threw the mostly full 2-liter bottle at the wall, which created an even bigger mess. Goodbye, nectar of the gods. Goodbye, quiet evening. Goodbye, happy wife. Goodbye, apple pie. We barely knew ye.

That was a pretty stupid move. I might be about as emotional as Mr. Spock, that doesn't mean I don't have or won't show my emotions from time to time. In any case, the Great Hawaiian Punch Incident of 2008 reminded me of another stupid, emotional thing I had done on Halloween some 20 years before. And that, in turn, reminded me of why I hate Halloween.

Like most children, I liked Halloween when I was really young. It wasn't until I became sentient at the age of 5 or 6 that I realized that being dressed up as a skunk or a clown by my parents wasn't for me. I always knew what I wanted to be for Halloween (a redcoat costume was my top choice), but I was always stuck with some god-forsaken clown suit that my mother had made. And I hated clowns--to this day, few things creep me out more. So, at that tender, young age, I gave up the clown suit and the makeup and refused to dress up for Halloween.

Obviously, it wasn't Halloween itself that was the problem. It was the costumes. After all, I was a kid, and what kid doesn't like damaging his teeth for life with mountains of candy? Whatever the case, it wasn't until I was in junior high school that I decided to make another go of Halloween. A friend of mine was going to go trick-or-treating in the next suburb over, and invited me to go with him. Hair metal was popular at the time, so I decided to go as a hair-metal headbanger. Or something like that. I had a denim jacket with military pins on it, a fake earring, and my "Guns 'n' Roses was here" t-shirt that all the chicks loved. It wasn't much of a costume, but I felt like it was more me, and that's what mattered most.

It was rainy that Halloween--a rarity for the LA area--and to make matters worse, my friend was late. He was supposed to call and then come by at a pre-appointed time. That time came and went. Half an hour passed. An hour passed. An hour and a half passed. Nothing. It was dark and rainy, and my dad told me he wasn't going to let me go out that late. For reasons I still don't understand, I became enraged and tears welled up in my eyes. I grabbed my electronic stopwatch, swung it around my head, and then slammed it into my desk chair, shattering the watch into dozens of little pieces. A very stupid move. Two minutes later, the doorbell rang. My friend was late, but he was ready to go trick-or-treating, and my dad let me go after some pleading and begging on my part. I had a pretty good time, but I was out a stopwatch.

It would be another 6-7 years before I would dress up for Halloween again. The people of Provo weren't exactly wowed by the BYU Dining Services uniforms I "borrowed" from the Cannon Center (the cafeteria in which I worked my first two years at BYU) and distributed to my friends, but at least we got our candy. That was the last time I dressed up for Halloween. It may be the last time I'll ever dress up for Halloween, unless someone conjures up a redcoat uniform and a really good reason for me to put it on.

I guess the moral of the story is three-fold:

1. Get your kids the costumes they really want.
2. Be careful when opening that refrigerator door.
2. Think before you do something stupid.