halloweeny.

Halloween is approaching which means a few good things. This year people will be watching kids run around dressed up as Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber. Seriously people, what happened to ghosts, witches, princesses and pumpkins? Those were the cute days. I ran the gamut of costumes as a young babe including a mouse, unicorn, witch complete with a sparkly spiderweb cape (but no hat because I didn't want to ruin my perm), Medieval princess and Jasmine. I looked good. Every. Year. The coolest thing was that my mom sewed every single one of my costumes so I wasn't walking around with a bunch of cheap junk hanging off me. I was the real deal.

In preschool I showed up to our dress-up day as a scarecrow, only to find out that everyone and their doll was a princess, including my teachers. I was devastated. My outfit was suuuper awesome and thanks to a little positive reinforcement from mi madre, I strutted into that room thinking I was the next Raggedy Ann. But instead of riding my ego wave, I felt like a huge ass for not getting the memo to be a princess. I can honestly remember thinking, "Why didn't Mom tell me? I bet she did this on purpose." In retrospect, it's a little weird that there were so many princesses in the room that day. My memory shows a flashbulb image of two mid-fifty-something women floating around in poofy dresses holding wands and granting everyone's wishes. Next they hug my friend Kim, who I always thought was cooler than me, and giggled about being twinsssss(!!!). Me? I was overlooked in my honky scarecrow outfit, even down to when we lined up for pictures... we all climbed onto the piano to take a picture and I sulked my way to the back. Traumatic, I know.

From that day on I made sure I had the coolest outfit to wear to my class's Halloween party. I also brought the coolest treats--owl cookies that my mom slaved over for hours in the days leading up to our parties. It's quite obvious that my mom is awesome. If only I were that cool.

Growing up I've found that most late-teen-early-twenties and hell, late 40's, women still try to fit into their childhood costumes. It's inevitable not to see a boob or butt cheek hanging out on Halloween. I never understood the whole slooty costume thing. In defiance, I dressed up as a sack of M&Ms one year in college. (I've mentioned this before.) Watching the ho-face Fanta Girls run around that night, I felt a little bit better about myself as I was safely secured in what only can be described as a sleeping bag.

This year will be no different. I'm tossing back and forth either being a ski bum or camp counselor. Sexy, I know. My boss lent me his super awesome ski onesies, so it might be impossible not to wear that. The benefits are endless: more room for booze in my belly--thank you, elastic waist band and buttons up the front, no possible reason to be self-conscious, and really, who wouldn't want to wear a neon ski suit? I might end up looking like Barney, but at least I'll be happy about it. Yet again, it's my little eff you to the preschool princesses.