Halloween

    Halloween was always important when Jack was growing up. For his first two Halloweens, I purchased super-hero sleepers from a baby-clothes catalog. I entered him in a costume contest at a local science fiction convention for his first Halloween, when he was six months old. He wore his “Batman” sleeper, but I called him “Bat-baby.” I made a cowl, a mask that covered his entire head, complete with pointy bat-ears, out of a soft fuzzy stretchy black fabric. He was a little puzzled when I pulled it down to his nose but he tolerated it well, blinking owlishly, as I had often dressed him in hats. This was the first one with eye-holes, however! I created a Batmobile by covering his walker with the same black stretchy fabric and sticking a construction-paper “Batman” logo on the front. I also made a bat-belt for myself, complete with bat-diaper and bat-bottle. We won a prize. Jack waved his little hands and tried to scamper around the large hall in his Bat-walker, a huge grin on his little face under the black cowl.

    The following year, Jack was walking under his own power, so his father took him out trick-or-treating. It was cold so I dressed him in two layers of thermal underwear, then covered them with his “Superman” sleeper, complete with little cape velcroed to his shoulders. I slipped his sneakers over the footies. I stayed home to hand out candy. John and Jack returned an hour later with their large bag just stuffed with candy. Jack smiled angelically as he sampled a few of the treats but he wasn’t that interested in eating much  - it was the hunt that excited him (this continued throughout his childhood - imagine - a kid who never ate his candy collection!). John helped himself to several large candy bars. The next night, after I dressed Jack in his sleeper in preparation for bedtime, he trotted straight to the outer door, smilingly waiting to go out into the night again, visiting the neighborhood and collecting candy with Daddy. He furrowed his brow in some confusion when I explained that Halloween wouldn’t happen again for another year, but eventually he went off to bed instead of outside.

    As he got older, Jack’s costumes grew more exotic. There was the year that he went as “Baby Godzilla,” waddling around in a foam soft-sculpture creation that I had spray-painted green. There was the knight’s costume; I had a hard time finding the stick-horsie that completed it. Then there was the year he discovered “Star Wars.” After much discussion and negotiation about what special effects were possible with reasonably available technology, he finally decided to dress as a Jawa, one of the little robed creatures that kidnapped R2D2. I made him an ankle-length, deeply hooded robe out of brown burlap, which closed with a rope-belt. I covered his face with black makeup, then took a black headband and equipped it with two large red LEDS, powered by 9 volt batteries. He wore the headband at eyebrow level. He pulled the hood of the robe so that, in limited light, it looked like the LEDs were his eyes, glowing weirdly over his hidden face. He also had an annoying electronic toy gun, to “zap” anyone who walked past him. At his first house, the owner gasped when she saw him strolling out of the dark, his “eyes” a piercingly evil sight. He was exactly the right height, too. When other kids saw him on the sidewalk, they stopped short or even jumped backwards in momentary fear, then came close to check out his costume. He was pleased with the entire effect. The candy was something to hoard until I threw it out in preparation for the Easter collection.

    In addition to creating a costume for Jack, I liked to dress up the house with carved pumpkins lit with candles, to decorate the doorstep. One year, a neighborhood boy commented once that we always had the best jack-o-lanterns. I was surprised; I thought that lots of people had the carved pumpkins, but, as I thought about it, ours always were pretty detailed, and I made as many as I could in the week before Halloween, so it looked pretty spooky.

    Once he got old enough to be in the Boy Scouts (fifth grade), Jack no longer did much trick-or-treating as he had to help with the community Halloween party in a local church hall. I stopped handing out candy as I was helping out at the party, too. I even gave up on carving jack-o-lanterns as I didn’t want to go to that much trouble only to have them smashed by some kid who was angry that there wasn’t anyone handing out candy.

    This is the first year in a long time that I'll be home. I don’t have a lot of candy to hand out, so when it runs out, I’ll turn out the lights. I didn’t carve a pumpkin, either. Maybe next year. I miss the build-up to Halloween, pulling together the finishing touches on this year’s costume. We never bought costumes; they were too chintzy and expensive. Mine were always a lot better than anything we could have purchased. I think I liked making costumes as much as Jack liked wearing them.