I want to dress up for Halloween, but I can’t find a strong drive to make it happen. Even now, Halloween morning, the idea of dressing up is tugging at me.

My 3 year old wanted to be a ghost but with no “Nice Ghost” options in sight he went with “Firefighter”. We went to the Halloween Spirit store and scrapped together a costume for him. The better quality firefighter costume that still contained all its parts inside the package was far too big. We found a jacket of okay quality in a package that was missing the hat and the “boots” (which were simple black leg coverings with reflective stripes just like that of the jacket). I went searching around in the hat section and found a misplaced fire helmet that went to yet another (missing in action) firefighter costume.

The place was chaos.

I did try on a Egyptian goddess type costume but it was so cheaply made that I could not bear to fork out the thirty bucks for a haphazard, throw-away costume.

Pass.

But, as I watch my son don his costume multiple times a day with a thoughtful look in his eye and, as I have the pleasure of seeing a boost in his imaginative play I feel a bit envious. I want to play dress up too!

It is so great seeing him feed his soul. What would feed my soul, at this point in my life, would take far too much work than this mama can handle these days. I would love to be a hybrid of things: a Gaia-esque, dancer, innovator, great thinker, goddess. Or something along those lines…

As I was getting warmed up to work at my little cafe table this morning, I just happened over to Heather Armstrong a.k.a. “dooce” ‘s blog and saw her link to this inspired site “Take Back Halloween : A costume guide for women with imagination”. Just get a load of this quote from this site:

Their lovely and wonderful costume ideas of Themistoclea and Medusa are the ones that most move me. I have actually been wanting to be Medusa for a while. I think I will wait until Will is a bit older just in case it freaks him out.

Medusa, said to be once beautiful until Athena cursed her, is ever beautiful to me. I love those snakes and her awesome power. Sick and twisted a bit? Probably, but she has ever had an effect on me since I saw Clash of the Titans. I want to be the Medusa with the writhing snakes in her hair. Except, when I “become” her, my snakes will be rubber.

Even if I don’t dress up, it was fun to think about the possibilities in my head. And I feel that could be just enough of a dose of fantasy for me right now.

… Tonight we will celebrate with dear friends with children of like ages to that of Will with an early pizza dinner so that we can get an early start on the amazing walk down Russell Street in Berkeley, California which is famous for its elaborately decorated houses and festive mood. If you go early its pretty kid-friendly. After dark, get your preschoolers and toddlers out of there! That’s when the ghouls come out that love nothing better than to scare the poo out of young and old indiscriminately.

Happy Halloween!