When it rains, it pours

            One of my favorite holidays of the year has always been Halloween. Of course, when I was much younger Halloween was as good as Christmas in my eyes. It was the only day of the year where I knew I was going to be able to restore my long depleted candy stash, which was not a regular fix in my household growing up. Cookies, cake and candy were reserved for special occasions and so our sweet tooth cravings could only be slightly satisfied with the likes of fruits and Flinstone vitamins otherwise. My parents didn't much celebrate Halloween like most American families do, with the orange and yellow lights streaming from their balconies, carved pumpkins sitting by the doors or scarecrows in display on the front lawn. This was mostly because it was a new holiday for them. Halloween wasn't something they celebrated in Portugal, at least not in the way they do here in the states, and so they were just then getting to know the new sense of the holiday through their American-born children. Also, I'm not sure if it was a money issue for them or they just plain didn't care for costume shopping at the time, but I remember it always feeling like pulling teeth to get them to finally go with us to Caldor's or Bradlees, which in Massachusetts was the "Wal-Mart" of the time. Every year was the same issue. With only a few days left before Halloween, my parents would pack my brothers and I into our little van and drive over to the nearest store, only to find the shelves half empty, with the only remaining costumes being the discarded rejects that were thrown haphazardly on the shelves after the other kids in the neighborhood ransacked the pile and picked out all the good ones like vultures. I was always slightly taller than average so my cheap plastic costumes would always float above my ankles like high waters and the masks would always sit on my face slightly askew with the holes never aligning right with my eyes. So I would usually be walking around, looking at the world through one eyehole praying that a car wasn't coming from the other direction, because I would never have seen it in time to dodge it.

            One year I decided I was going to just make my own costume. I was very creative at a young age, thanks to my grandmother (and MacGyver), although, I didn't have many materials to work with at the mere age of seven or eight. Therefore, I decided to use what recourses I had available to me and that I knew how to work with best, construction paper. I don't know what gave me the idea to be a flower, but the four colors I had in my stash ruled out many other possibilities and a flower just seemed to fit the mold. It took nearly a week to construct the masterpiece but every night after school I went to work on the design in my head until it was constructed to perfection. Petal by petal, leaf by leaf, I had cut out, taped and stapled each one into their proper place. When it was finished, eight large purple petals attached to a band surrounded my face, two large green leaves protruded from my midsection, which were attached to a green sweatshirt and green sweatpants, and I had in my hand, a long brown staff made from a collection of empty paper towel and toilet paper rolls that I had salvaged that week, with an array of smaller green leaves attached to it. It was a royal accessory I added, like Poseidon's trident. I had shown my hard work to my mother as it had progressed throughout the week, but the finished product was not seen on me until the day of Halloween. That would be a surprise.

            As the sun was setting that evening and dinner was consumed, my brothers and I ran to our rooms and got ready for the nights adventures. I was so excited and couldn't wait to show everyone the fruits of my labor. When I walked down to show my parents, they didn't laugh but they had smirks of amusement on their faces that I took at the time to mean that they were just as amazed by my work as I was. But now when I think back on it I think those strange smirks were their attempts at not letting bursts of laughter explode from their throats. I don't remember how my brothers reacted to the costume but I'm sure it wasn't any different than the slapsticks I had to endure on any other given day. I was on top of the world. I made my costume with my own two hands and I saved my parents money they didn't have and the trouble they didn't need...until, minutes into our trick or treating, it began to pour like a tropical rainstorm that didn't let out for the rest of the night. My poor perky purple petals were plastered over my face just as soon as the rain started and my sad little green leaves were as wilted over my soggy green sweats. I was so sad at the state of me but I just kept right on knocking on those doors. That year, I had collected more candy than I ever remember having in my lifetime. I think everyone I greeted felt so stinking sorry for me in my pitiful state that they just kept loading my bag with handfuls of candy, hoping that it would keep my spirits lifted and keeping me from feeling discouraged by my attempt in the fashion world. I had collected so much candy I had to grab a new bag from my parents, who where following us in the van with my cousin Donaria and her husband, Fabio.

            Last night I was having a hard time falling asleep so I decided to organize a few things in the apartment. While putting together a few pictures of my most recent adventures, I came across some old albums of my childhood that my mother had given me some years ago. As I was time traveling through those pictures I was reminded of those long forgotten Halloweens growing up and began to feel a little nostalgic. I yearned for some tradition. I've been so busy preparing for my trip to Peru next week that I've nearly bypassed one of my favorite holidays without so much as a thought about it, until now. I couldn't have that. Holidays were meant to be celebrated, and in my eyes, it's not a holiday without sweets to much on. So, at two o'clock in the morning, under a veil of rain, I ran over to the corner bodega, bought myself a bag full of candy, sat in front of my massive dinosaur of a TV and watched a marathon of scary movies until I was in a candy coma. It may be a little early for celebrating Halloween, but since I won't be in my homeland on that given day, I figured I could just start my celebrating now while I could.