Dressing For Halloween

Some Christians fuss about the 31st of October. I don’t recall this being a thing until this century. Maybe it was in the 60s, but my parents were rather overprotective. We got those suffocating plastic masks and assembled sugary loot from homes in the neighborhood. Kids dressing up as para-scary things that weren’t really very scary when you thought about it. 

When I was a young adult, I occasionally dressed up as something. It usually depended on a girlfriend who held a party or arranged to take me to such a thing. I remember walking through a tough neighborhood in my city to catch up with a friend. A kid asked me, a brown-robed figure, what I was. “A monk,” I replied. 

“He says he’s a monk,” the lad yelled to his friend down the street. Then asked me more directly, “What’s a monk?”

Evangelicals seem squeamish about the “hallow” or holy part of the holiday. Jesus-ween. Octo-ween. Fall-o-ween. Unless a mom is into making costumes–and I know some are–dressing up will be largely guided by our corporate masters. What will sell. Otherwise, I don’t get the problem here. 

Kids know though. The only costuming that really matters is what the sugar is wearing before you rip open the package and consume.

One laudable development is the parking lot trunk or treat. When the miss was young, I recall dressing up as a mad scientist. A few modest special effects, especially my favorite: carved pumpkins spewing their “guts” out their mouth and nose. 

Me, I like the goodies that mix the dark chocolate and nuts, like on the right. Plus the Witch Head Nebula, top, by NASA/Gary Stevens, picture prepared by Adrian Pingstone – http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010227.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1322057.