Halloween Costumes

                       Doll made by my sister Maureen (all recycled items)

An advertisement in my newspaper this morning invited people to come to the Ag. Coop Exchange to learn 101 tips for sewing. Oh how I could have used this when my children were little, especially when it was close to Halloween. I am one of seven children and Halloween was one of our favorite days of the year! All that candy!!! We also had a mother who was a good seamstress, very artistic and imaginative. She could whip up a costume, with the help of her children,  in a heartbeat, and did every year for each of us. Back then, there were no ready-made costume stores; you had to create your own if you were to be seen  in your neighborhood on "All Hallows Eve," pillow-case in hand, going door to door for treats.Around this time every year, my brothers and sisters would sit at the table over dinner and discuss what they were going to be on this frightful night in our young lives. My mother's sharp attention would help to steer the conversation towards something she (we) could either sew up, or create. It was usually my brother John who had the wildest ideas, and often Mother had to discourage him from wanting to be a donkey or a horse, i.e. Then, when we were ready, the Conlan kids would go out en mass, the oldest looking after the youngest, always taking her hand. This would have been my sister Chris. We would go as ghosts, witches, cowboys (cowgirls, my favorite), princesses, exotic, scary creatures, goblins, T.V. characters or cartoons all of which Mother helped to create. Back home with our stash, we would spread out our "loot" across the living room rug trading back and forth for the kinds of candy we liked the best. I always had to watch my two brothers very carefully during this period of exchange. For me, as a kid, Halloween was the best! But as an adult, and mother of two, it was the worst! I was clearly not my mother; I neither sewed nor had her keen imagination and artistic touch. And, even then, there were no Costume stores from which to simply buy an outfit. So, off my children went, year after year, in something created and put together by us...whatever we could come up with at the time, and though I was not my mother, we did not do too badly, even though the weeks before almost gave me hives. The thing we could always count on, however, was that no other kid had their costume; it was a unique creation and one of a kind. Somehow, even with all the angst, I think it was better.
As you can see above, my sister inherited my Mother's artistic talent. Wouldn't this make a great costume???

Every year at this time, I cannot help but think of my best friend who is now gone. Over Halloween several years ago, I spent a week with Sara in the hospital as she went through a bone-morrow transplant. Her favorite holiday of the year was Halloween; this is one of the things I loved about her...she loved dressing up, being goofy, and laughing...often at herself. She made me laugh all the time. I love a phrase from John Updike that I lifted from one of his novels which says, "When an exhilarating personality dies, it is the live performance we remember, the unduplicated presence, the shimmer and sparkle, and poignance, perceived from however far back a seat in the audience." This is how I think about Sara, and am grateful that I had a front row seat in her life. I also like the quote by Jeanne Moreau on the death of his best friend, "It would be unbearable if memory didn't exist...I hear your laughter. I see you writing in your office, the smoke from your cigarette forcing you to blink. At will, I can spend hours with you." For me it is hearing Sara playing the piano, or the flute, or laughing. When we were at the hospital together, I wrote a poem about that time, and want to remember it here.

SCARY HALLOWEEN

Her stem cell transplant
Is on Halloween
An event she never expected
On her favorite day of the year

She dresses up anyway
As she does every year
In orange and black
With a mask
Not nearly as scary as the masks
Doctors are wearing
In the hospital

She laughs and jokes
With the nurses
To protect the frightened
Small child inside
And knits a lovely scarf
As her own harvested stem cells
Drip slowly into her veins
To give new life

She refuses to be sick
Until the end of the knitting row
Is finished
And then,
"I have to throw up,
But not until I finish this row," she says

And then she begins
The wrenching, heart-breaking sounds
Of heaving her insides up
And when she is spent
Goes on knitting to get the scarf
Done by Christmas
A scarf for her daughter

And then...
Life goes on
One minute at a time
Whether outside in sunshine
Or inside the gray walls
Of this city hospital
Sitting among
A community of patients
With sad, solemn faces
In the chemo room
Hot and stuffy
Life saving masks over their faces
And the human determination to live
The joy of Halloween
Lost on them

Here, hope is to be well by Thanksgiving
In order to give thanks
And to feel good enough for
Pumpkin Pie
And really....just not to die
Too soon, too early
Too much before their time

This is the second time
For my friend to do this
The last big effort
For life-saving energy
To pour through her veins
And take hold.

She knows what is ahead of her
And the thought makes her weak
With the memory
Of medicines that make you sick
Multi-colored ones
Like Halloween treats
And the energy that will
Drain from her body
Before the new cells begin to grow

This living hell
Even though tempory
Does not feel like temporty
It feels like a lifetime
Of misery
And it is hard to see
"the finished line."

But, she will go on
With the will to live
Second by second
Minute by minute
Hour by hour
Day by day
And week by week
Until it is done

And then
There will be new Halloweens
To celebrate
And to, once again
Dress up in costume
Not ever again
As scary as this Halloween.

Sara had several Halloweens to celebrate before her death, and I am grateful for that.