I can’t remember a day in my life when dressing up didn’t sound appealing. Between Halloween, birthday parties, and days I chose to dress up for the heck of it, I can’t physically count the amount of costumes I’ve bought or created for myself.
I didn’t wait for Halloween, either. I saw every day as an opportunity to wear something a little bit more wild or wacky than the norm of what kids usually wore to school. My mother has photos of me as young as 3-years-old, wearing a hodge-podge of clothing she bought for me, completely mismatched.
She never gave me restrictions with clothing, and this allowed me to be creative. Throughout fifth grade, I vividly recall dressing up on Fridays with my friends. Wearing boas and mismatched high socks were part of our elementary school identities.
The truth is that dressing up in costumes gave me an outlet to be someone I was not. On days where I had too much energy building up inside me (pretty much every single day of my childhood), costumes gave me a way to let that excitement out in a rainbow of colors, literally.
When Halloween came along each year, I pulled out all the stops. There was the Halloween in fourth grade that I dyed my hair a reddish-purple color, went to extensive lengths to find a vintage turban, borrowed a long skirt and shawl from my mom, and somehow pulled off the countenance of a fortune teller. Throughout other years I was a vampire, a witch, even a mad scientist.
There were not many restrictions on my Halloween wardrobe where I grew up in southern California; most years I didn’t have to worry about freezing while I was trick or treating. There was one year, though, when it actually rained on Halloween. I was seven and had very little body fat to keep me warm, and I’d chosen to be Tinker Bell.
I was traumatized to say the least: I made a vow to never shiver in a skimpy costume on Halloween ever again. This probably made my mother happy as I hit my teenage years, but the result for me was simply one of complete and utter comfort.
Just that one costume changed my opinion of my Halloween outfits forever. I began to opt for fully clothed costumes — just as extravagant and wacky as all my other costumes had been, but also comfortable and warm for the occasion of being outside trick or treating/causing mischief.
As a result of this, I decided to make the most badass, comfortable, and impassioned costume for the Halloween of my eighth grade year. As a result of my mother’s creative genius and my obsession with narwhals, I was able to create the hands-down most unique costume I’ve ever come into contact with. I transformed myself into a long-toothed whale with a Hanes men’s sweatsuit, some brown/tan felt, and some cotton stuffing for the tusk.
I looked the best I’ve ever looked that Halloween. I not only had the coolest costume in my whole middle school, but I also was able to bring awareness to narwhals being threatened due to climate change.
When people would ask me if I was a unicorn, I pridefully corrected then and told them I was a narwhal. I then went on a rant about the narwhal, the fact that they’re very real animals inhabiting the arctic, and that the “horn” they have on their head is actually a tusk. I was not only the walking narwhal girl in this costume, but I was a walking narwhal info booth.
Later Halloweens brought similar costumes, which I tend to recycle. My flying squirrel onesie is my current favorite, but my full body, turtleneck, velvet cheetah print jumper is a close second. This year, I’ve added a new costume to my addition: a wedding dress I found at Goodwill will aid in my Rachel from the first episode of “Friends” costume.
Every Halloween has always been a long, well-thought-out process for me. But it’s never been too drawn out — I’d even venture to say that Halloween is never drawn out enough.
Costuming should be an everyday occurrence like it was for me when I was younger. I nominate every day as costume day; cheers to the fortune tellers, wacky dressers, Tinker Bells, narwhals, cheetahs, flying squirrels, and trick or treaters this Halloween.
Reach writer Rebecca Gross at arts@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @becsgross
