A Thai Halloween

The last time I remember genuinely dressing up for Halloween was in the third grade.

I don’t even remember what I was, only what I wanted to be: a cell phone. But this was the late 90s, so it wasn’t like a cool, sleek phone — I had my heart set on a $40 costume of a gray brick of a phone that my family definitely could not afford.

Imagine something like this, but large enough to fit an 8-year old.

Unable to reach a compromise — cell phone or bust! — I think my mom just reused my costume from the year before and I was a (very rotund) pumpkin in the school parade, yet again.

Soon after that I became too self-conscious for costumes; even as I grew into a theatre kid, I mostly stuck to backstage roles. Pretending to be a French revolutionary or talking goose was never going to be my calling or comfort zone. Add to that a propensity for being easily frightened, and Halloween quickly tanked to become my least-favorite holiday. Seriously, why are there spiders in my grocery aisle? Please let me shop for canned tuna and cheese whiz in peace.

In the years since, I’ve skated by by throwing on an old Gaelic football jersey and going to events as “athlete”, if I bothered to dress up at all. Somehow though, this October I didn’t feel as Scroogey as in the past, and I allowed myself to give in. Halloween is pretty big where I work, and I just didn’t feel like fighting it (and honestly, the warm weather helps keep the Halloween spookies at bay). If you can’t beat ’em, etc.

I threw together a black dress and white collared shirt from my closet, black boots I’d just had made in Hoi An, and purchased black tights (that will be repurposed for my trip to London this winter — I’m still going to be practical here). Threw my hair into pigtails, and, ta-da:

Wednesday Addams!

What I forgot in my preparations for all this, however, was that my Thai work permit is being renewed soon. A process that requires…an annual medical check.

And that is how I ended up in a Thai hospital dressed as Wednesday Addams for Halloween 2022. The looks I got from the local grannies and nurses!

Maybe next year I’ll go as a cell phone.

 

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