I . . . hate Hallowe’en.
I blame my hatred of Hallowe’en on the following:
a) Costumes. Growing up in Alberta, there was usually snow on the ground by October 31st and some years, flesh could freeze in 30 seconds. This meant that no matter how elaborate your costume, no matter how long you or your mom laboured on it, every kid basically looked like an Eskimo-something. Eskimo-clown, Eskimo-vampire, Eskimo-ballerina, Eskimo-judge. I remember one year where I just stopped fighting it. I wore a long skirt over my snowpants and strapped a black kite with eyes to my parka. No one even asked.
b) Candy. As some of you may remember from an earlier post, holidays that involve candy were always traumatic in some way, mainly because I wanted to eat all the candy, RIGHT NOW and my parents weren’t into that. At Easter, they could give me books in the Easter basket but at Hallowe’en, there’s no denying that it’s all about the goodies. In order to calm our appetites before going trick-or-treating, my brother and I each had to consume a giant, steaming bowl of red cabbage. The cabbage was both filling and warming, but it also tended to repeat on you. The resulting BRAAAAAAAP! noises issuing from us were far scarier than any of the spooky Hallowe’en records playing in the neighbourhood. And my brother found out the hard way that sweet Mrs. Russell tends to give you less candy when you belch big cabbage in her face.
c) More about the candy. I’m sure this only happened a couple of times, but in my kid-brain it was a yearly thing: my mom would not get enough candy to hand out to the neighbourhood kids. So my dad, Jaro and I would come home from a tour of the block and while we were swinging our arms around to get the feeling back in our frozen hands, my mom would refill our bowl by TAKING OUR CANDY, often (and this is the real indignity) with little or no regard of the quality of the pieces. Our spoil thus reduced by half, Jaro and I would head out again into the frigid night and hit a different street, hoping to god that someone on this block was handing out the full-size Oh Henrys we’d had wrested from us earlier.
d) Candy again. I think our folks were trying to teach us will-power and responsibility by not locking the candy up once the night was over. We got the keep the candy, but had to hang the bags on the outside of our doors so that they could make sure we weren’t having all-night kitkat fests in our rooms. I can’t remember if my parents began this practice before or after the year Jaro ate EVERY LAST PIECE OF CANDY in his bag on Hallowe’en night - I DO remember being disappointed when they decided that being horribly sick was punishment enough. Clearly, I was a terrible sister.
e) In the days following Hallowe’en, the candy on the outside of my door became an obsession and a source of friction between me and my parents. How much could I eat and still get away with? I developed a technique whereby I would eat a piece and then re-fashion the wrapper to make it LOOK like there was still candy in it, so that my parents couldn’t tell, on their nightly check-in, that I’d eaten it. When they took to judging the bag of candy by WEIGHT instead, I started to wrap up erasers and pennies in the discarded candy wrappers. Hee hee hee.
Obviously, I was completely insane. When I get around to having a little past life regression, I’ll be interested to see if I grew up in extreme poverty in a former life, because little else would account for that wholly consuming fear of deprivation. I mean, seriously. If I had devoted that amount of time to schoolwork instead of devising ways to hoodwink my parents in the Yearly Affair of the Hallowe’en Candy Bag, I would probably be a brain surgeon by now.
Anyway - now that I’m a grown up, I can have all the Hallowe’en candy I want! But the candy has changed since I was a kid. I know we’ve all commented on how, as we’ve grown bigger, the candy has gotten smaller (because it HAS. “Fun size” my ASS). The candy has also gotten more expensive and now costs so much BEFORE Hallowe’en that I am tempted to ask the cashier if I’ll be getting a handjob along with the candy. Usually, I wait until AFTER Hallowe’en to stock up on tiny packets of M&Ms and I was fully planning to this year. But then Katr and I got all gung-ho and went to the gym this morning at 6 a.m. and now I don’t feel like eating my weight in Rockets. Interesting.
In other news, Hysteria is still happening over at Buddies! It occurs to me that since my piece is on Saturday, I should probably get to learning my lines. Ha ha . . . yeah.
Comments:
oh my god… that is pee-my-self funny.
I too had a candy-nicking-mom… albeit of a different stripe. Try this on for size.
My mom, a candy addict from way back, after berating me mercilously for wanting to sort my candy… (I’m a big geek), she used to “help” me. Often leaving me wondering why the load felt lighter after being sorted. Until one year when I got up halfway through and found a stash of the good stuff hidden behind her back where I couldn’t see it until I stood up. And thus the reason she didn’t want me sorting… ‘cause I counted too.
Comment by Lex — Tuesday, November 1, 2005 @ 7:20 pm
Eskimo-dyke.
Butterfingers hand job. Yum. Except that shit sticks in your teeth.
Comment by New York Ex — Wednesday, November 2, 2005 @ 1:11 am
I had a Halloween in Alberta in 3rd grade. Damn-damnity-damn it was cold! First time I had to get the costume over the snowsuit and then my mask almost froze to my face. I remember it as one of the worst Halloweens, mostly because of the cold but also because we didn’t know where the ‘good’ neighboorhoods were to score the sweet loot.
Comment by Chris Nolan.ca — Wednesday, November 2, 2005 @ 3:50 am
In my old age, I have become a Halloween scrooge. I purposely don’t purchase candy, and keep my downstairs lights turned off.
Halloween candy, and I really didn’t think this was possible, but Halloween candy, the dedicated, Halloween-only candy, that is, is even worse then Easter candy. Everything tastes like plastic.
When I was wee, the Smiths from Smith and Smith and Red Green fame lived on my best friend’s street. They gave out jumbo European chocolate bars. Now THAT’S a giveaway.
Comment by Melissa — Wednesday, November 2, 2005 @ 4:35 pm
Lex, how sneaky and devilish of your mom! “Helping” during the sorting - how calculating. Hilarious.
Chris - your mask freezing to your face is giving me flashbacks. Good to know I wasn’t alone.
NYEx - if only I’d been “out” back then! Then again, probably best not. We are talking about 1980’s Alberta, after all, and it’s hard to flee for your life in snowpants.
Melissa - SWEET.
Comment by Rose — Wednesday, November 2, 2005 @ 6:44 pm
um..creamypuff…you’ve got a meme waiting for you!
Comment by newyorkex — Thursday, November 3, 2005 @ 8:29 pm
Ooo! That’s a good one. I’m all over it!
Comment by Rose — Thursday, November 3, 2005 @ 8:56 pm
Wish I was around to see the hysteria show. Sounds hilarious. Do you have them in full Victoria garb? That’s going to be one hot reenactment.
Comment by Chris — Saturday, November 5, 2005 @ 6:15 am
Ah, I like Halloween, but I think it’s a lot more lo key here in the UK. As a kid I LOVED dressing up, so Halloween was always a welcome opportunity for costume adventures.
Comment by Winter — Saturday, November 5, 2005 @ 4:18 pm
Fantastic! I had to repress the urge to hand out my own kid’s candy when we began to get low this year. I’m glad I resisted and chose to turn the outside lights off instead–he might have wound up in therapy over it years later! Thanks for the laugh.
Comment by Katie — Sunday, November 6, 2005 @ 7:45 pm
Chris - they WERE in full Victorian regalia. And it WAS hot. I wish I had taken pictures . . .
Winter - loved the pumpkin photo on your blog. Was that this year’s costume?
And Katie - good for you!! I hope your son knows how lucky he is.
Comment by Rose — Wednesday, November 9, 2005 @ 6:20 pm
Heh heh, no. It was only my costume for as long as I could hold it up in front of my face for the camera…which wasn’t long because it was very heavy. After that I just watched the film Halloween with my sister. Then she had to drive home alone and all scared.
Comment by Winter — Saturday, November 12, 2005 @ 8:17 pm