PERSONAL: HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!

I'm not so hot on Halloween these years, even though I've had a special affinity growing up for it. After all, it happens in the same month as my birthday... of course, then, it's my holiday.

My mother loves Halloween, or, did, growing up. We were one of those families that, though lacking the spook house outside, had more kitsch inside for the holiday than any other place on the planet save a Hallmark store. I still remember the antique light up spookhouse that my mother has, complete with window pains made of what look like sugar. I still adore it and curse the fact that I broke one of the many pieces growing up. We also had a black cat, which my mother said she hated. On Halloween, she was sure to find that damn cat and bring it inside. There are sicko's out there, she would say.

These days, I don't do Halloween. So much so that last year I didn't go out; this year, I'm working. I think that should be fairly indicative about the tepidness of my feelings toward it. It's suprising because I thought, as an adult, this would be the holiday I would get into.

But it never panned out that way.

I hate horror movies, and the amount of candy consumed is almost disgusting at times. I can't get over the engorgement of chocolates and hard candies that occur from about my birthday to the end of the month and the weeks afterward where all you can think is If I see another tootsie roll, I'm going to cut someone's head off. It has become... well, boring.

My friends get into it, and the constant comparison of what they are wearing annoys me. Mainly because I have not worn a costume since I was 14 years old. I don't have that great of ideas.

There is no point to this post, except to say, I wish I was still involved. I wish I loved it the way my mother does, the way my friends do. I wish, at least, there was something more to it, in my head at least, than Elvira with a beer. It seems to have just come down to that and nothing more. There are always reasons to get drunk; I just don't see the sense in covering myself in fake blood as a reason to do just that.

And, with that depressing anecdote, I wish all of you...

Happy Halloween!!!!