I’m not much of a holiday person. Sure when I was a kid I was into it, but as I got older I became less and less interested. There was no big moment when I suddenly said, “I don’t like holidays!” I think as time moved forward and I studied more history I got less excited about any holiday.
My Daughter as a Flying Monkey around 1995. We made the costume ourselves.
My daughter and granddaughter love Halloween. I used to take my daughter trick or treating when she was little and that was fun. Now, I stay home with the dogs as they go out and hit the neighborhood. My granddaughter is so excited this time of year. I enjoy watching her excitement and I know I used to be that way.
When I was kid growing up in Portland many times it would rain on Halloween. I remember many times I was not allowed to go trick or treating because I had a cold. Of course I was devastated but somehow I always ended up with some candy. I think my parents probably forced my sisters to share with me.
An early memory was going out with my older sister and my father. The ground was wet and I was dragging my bag behind me as we went from house to house. We all used paper bags back then and by the time I got home the bottom of my bag had gotten soaked and disintegrated. Yep, the candy was all gone, there was nothing in my bag but a hole. Apparently a lot of tears were shed and my sister had to share her candy with me.
As we got older, both my parents worked so we usually had to wait for one of them to get home. It was usually my mother and she wouldn’t get home until 5:45 and by then kids were already out and we were going crazy waiting for her arrival so we could join them. She would always check our costumes before she would let us go.
A few blocks away from our house were two apartment complexes which were our favorite places to go. So much potential candy in a small space. It was trick or treating at it’s most efficient.
When I was old enough to drive of course I would pick up some of my friends and we would cruise around various neighborhoods. We never bothered younger kids, we left them alone. Sometimes we would encounter kids from other high schools and I know that eggs would fly back and forth. My first car was a 1964 Chevrolet station wagon. I paid $300 for it and the backend never sat as high up as the front end. It always looked like it was dragging the back end. Being a station wagon I could really pile a lot of kids into it. The police pulled me over one Halloween because I had too many people in the car. Basically they took the left over eggs and let us go.
I have always had this thing about “forced frivolity”. I have never liked themed or costume parties. It all seems forced. In film school I did go to one party with my buddy Richard. Costumes were required. I had an actress friend help me because she was a great seamstress. I decided on going as a giant rat. I had no money so I went out and bought one pair of gray sweatpants and two gray sweatshirts. My actress friend cut the sleeves off one of the sweatshirts and we stuffed them with paper, she sewed the together and made a tail that she attached to the sweatpants. I added a pair of Converse high tops and some mouse ears I got at Disneyland a few years earlier.
My buddy Richard went as an Italian Neo-Realist. The party was in Beverly Hills and as we were walking towards our friends apartment a car slammed on it’s brakes and one of the guys yelled out the window that my costume was “awesome”!
We arrived at the party and it was fine. I was ready to go within a few minutes of arriving, but we didn’t. I was not the only one that was anti-social. One of the other guys we were in school with spent the entire evening sitting on the balcony smoking cigarettes and staring off into the distance. He had wrapped a blue sheet around himself and decorated it with tinsel and a few ornaments. When asked what he was, he replied he was a Christmas tree. When it was pointed out that he was blue he said, he was an artificial Christmas tree.
At the end of the night he walked back into the apartment, told the host he had a wonderful time and left. I am not sure if he had been smoking something besides cigarettes but he was certainly in his own world that night. We left soon thereafter.
I don’t recall ever dressing up to go to a costume party after that. If I did I have erased that from my memories. I do enjoy being social, I just don’t like guidelines, or expectations. And don’t get me started on New Years Eve parties… talk about expectations!
I know a lot of people love costume and themed parties, and more power to them. If you like holidays and dressing up, keep doing it. And feel free to invite me. Just know that I probably won’t attend.
Happy Halloween everyone! I hope you all have a great time tonight. I will give out some candy and look forward to my granddaughter coming home and telling me how much fun she had.
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This is the promo I did for my book, Road Dog oh so many years ago. It talks about my years on the road touring. The video was done by my friend Martin Vavra. I hope you enjoy it.
https://vimeo.com/194118693?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
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