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It's getting to be that time of year again, Halloween, I mean; one of the few times where grown-ups get a license to try on other identities, play out their fantasies, comment on their realities, or simply enjoy being something they're not (or wish they were), the way we all did as kids. A few of us resist the urge, and a few deliberately avoid it, but for a lot of folks, it doesn't take a huge amount of arm-twisting to get them to join in.
Some need an excuse: "Oh, I'm taking the kids Trick-or-Treating, guess I should dress up too..." or "I'm handing out candy this year, so I might as well..." or even "Eh, the office is doing a thing, I guess I have to come up with a costume..." but most people, once decked out as their temporary alter ego, seem to get into the spirit of things pretty quickly, and a lot of folks positively revel in it.
And why not? Playing make-believe is one of the earliest games we enjoy as kids, and we reluctantly give it up as we grow up...only to perform a more subtle, but no less important variation of it as he figure out who we are going to be when we grow up. As teens and young adults, we try on various personae, dress to signify our membership in a particular group, and even adopt the mannerisms and habits of those we wish to emulate or join.
Some of us cycle through a lot of these, discarding some of the trappings and affectations along the way (Adios, spiky Mohawk! Farewell, '80s Power Suit! Au revoir, grungy, work-inappropriate combat boots!) and -- for better or worse -- keeping (or perhaps getting stuck with) others.
Case in point: that nasty nicotine addiction that started, for me, with a cigarette I bummed from a group of cool, music-obsessed fellow students at a college party. I wanted to fit in with them, and joining the smoking huddle was an easy way to look like I belonged with this group of strangers.
Yeah, I know. Seemed like a good idea at the time. In retrospect, not so much.
Long after I'd ditched nearly every external sign of the uniforms and habits of my rebellious youth, I was stuck with that dangerous relic of a time when I acted without thinking more often than not, long after I'd grown tired of it stinking up the joint. It took more than two decades for me to ditch that particular Bad Decision.
And yet, this time of year often has me confronting my old smokey nemesis. A surprising number of costumes feature a cigarette or cigar as a prop, and quite a few of those dreaded "Social Smokers" use the holiday to trot out a persona that just happens to smoke. How conveeeeenient. Y'know what? All you Holly Golightlys with your mile-long cigarette holders and you Cigar Hobos and Grouchos can bite me. And get that thing outta my face already!!
Ahem. Just sayin'.
Last year it reached critical mass at a Mad Men themed Halloween Party where virtually everyone's costume involved a cigarette. It being held in overwhelmingly nonsmoking Cambridge, MA, nearly all of the props were fakes, or had been "disabled" for the occasion; nobody actually lit up inside (or indeed, outside, as far as I could tell). But it was decidedly weird to see a room full of people using their prop cigarettes to make grand, dramatic gestures, or to see people getting a kick out of posing with fake cigarettes. And it was very weird to pick up a [fake] cigarette for the first time in five years and realize that my muscle memory knew exactly how to hold it, and that I instinctively steered around people as if the thing was actually lit, just as I did at parties for so many years.
It also reminded me of a time when cigarettes WERE a costume of sorts for me, a little disguise I hid behind, my smoke a mask for who I really was or to project the "edgy, creative" vibe I so coveted back then. It was disconcerting. After about an hour, I handed off my prop to a sister who had never smoked (and never will smoke) and instantly felt better.
This year, I won't be wearing a costume that requires I tote around a reminder of my former smoking self. In fact, I'll go so far as to say I probably won't be donning any more costumes where smoking is part of the "look." This year -- inspired by a fabulous, glossy black feather boa I liberated from Goodwill -- I'm going as a Raven.
"But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther then he uttered — not a feather then he fluttered —
Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown before —
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before."
Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." - Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven
Nevermore, indeed.
So, any funny costume stories, favorite outfits, or spooky happenings in your neck of the woods this evening? (And no, Christine O'Donnell doesn't count...) Spill!
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