Thompson: Good costumes can be challenging
You have to appreciate the person who, in planning a Halloween costume, totally loses his mind.
He spends months contemplating painting himself blue, dyeing his underpants, renting a backhoe, borrowing someone’s guinea pig, and planning a daring entry to the party involving dynamite and a coffin.
I’ve never done any of those things, except for once letting someone put 10 pounds of unidentified goo in my hair to make it stick up. I’m not sure why. My costume was a black cat, not the Bride of Frankenstein. But I’d had some Halloween cocktails and too many miniature candy bars (recipe for disaster), and it seemed like a good idea at the time.
Tip: Make sure ALL the goo is out of your hair before you go to bed.
I’m lucky to have a great seamstress for a mom. She made full costumes with pants and shirts and whiskers and helmets and capes and antennas and lights and buzzers. One lean year, in a fit of procrastination (mine, not hers), she hewed off the bottom of her college commencement ceremony gown and made me a graduate. In sixth grade, her piéce de résistance was a Roger Rabbit get-up complete with suspenders, gloves and furry headgear.
Otherwise, my Halloween costumes have been lame. And by lame, I don’t mean lamé, as in “covered in sparkles.” I once took a bottle to a party and called myself a baby. Other people did, too.
I did have a few clever ideas in college. I impersonated spunky TV orphan Punky Brewster – for whom I was a dead ringer at age 7 – and a year later, I went as Monica Lewinsky (there were several Bill Clintons at that party who didn’t recognize me).
Four years ago, I was a bridesmaid in a late-October wedding on the South Side of Chicago.
The White Sox won the World Series on Wednesday. My friend had her rehearsal dinner Thursday. The Sox had their parade Friday. My friend got married Saturday. How’s that for luck?
The bridesmaid dresses were beautiful – a deep, but bright autumnal red, trimmed with delicate rosettes across the neckline (yes, I do help with the bridal page). We all had our hair done and wore sparkly jewelry and painful shoes.
After the reception, we decided to have a round at Bourbon Street, a nightclub and sports bar in Merrionette Park, where both the Sox victory and Halloween were being celebrated.
We arrived together, the ladies in their bridesmaids gowns, the fellas in their tuxes, my friend in her elegant wedding gown.
A stranger leaned in to me and said over the music something to the effect of, “Those are the best costumes ever! You guys really went all out.”
Well, it did take months of planning.
• Jana Thompson can be reached at jthompson@nwherald.com.
