My first Halloween memory is a bad one.
Back in the day before product licensing allowed kids to become their favorite characters in realistic detail, we did not have cute Halloween costumes. For those born after 1980, this was during the Mesozoic era. Back then, everyone selected from about a dozen generic Halloween costumes. If you had a creative mom, she added her own original touches that made you stand out from your friends.
When I was in Kindergarten, Mom thought I would make a cute Halloween bunny. I don't know why. It was raining Halloween morning, but I climbed into my cheap fuzzy rabbit suit and put on the stiff plastic mask. In those days the masks were always too small for a child's face and only had 2 tiny air holes.
Before I left the house, Mom decided I looked like an anorexic bunny, and stuffed the front of my suit with 3 standard bed pillows. Mind you, I was 5 years old. By the time she finished, I was late for school. I ran the block and a half in the rain... unable to breath through the 2 tiny air holes... and with 3 pillows weighing me down. I crossed the street to the school grounds, tripped on the curb and fell flat on my face.
Problem - I was stuffed with so many pillows, I could not get up. I just rocked back and forth. I rocked forward until may hands touched the ground, then rocked back until my toes touched, but I couldn't get my hands and feet on the ground at the same time. The 6th Grader who was serving as Crossing Guard that morning laughed until he got a pain in his side. Then he helped me up and took my to my class. By then I was bawling.
My ancient teacher, Mrs. Sheehan, who was rumored to have come over on the Mayflower, dried me off with some smelly brown paper towels. Then it was time for the Halloween Parade. I had no idea what this entailed until it was too late.
The Kindergarteners were taken to every class - 1st through 8th grade - so the older students could see how cute we were. This was some sort of twisted school tradition. That morning, we started with the 8th graders. As we walked up the aisle between desks, my pillows shifted and I got stuck.
The "helpful" 8th graders shoved me from desk to desk until I reached the front of the room. Mrs. Sheehan removed 2 of my pillows and carried them for me. She was a trooper.
It was a very long, very emotional day, that Halloween. Mom was waiting for me after school, so excited to hear about my fun-filled day. What she got was an earful from little me! I was so exhausted I skipped trick-or-treating that night. There was no way I was leaving the house in that stupid rabbit suit again! I never cared for the holiday after that. But in the ensuing years, I was always kind to the Kindergarteners when they came to our classroom for the annual Halloween Parade.
