Hoelloween

Ah, fall. The crispness of the air, the rustle of the leaves, and the clack-clack-clack of high heeled shoes hitting the pavement. Yes, that night of the year is upon us again. The night when the skirts shoot up, the lashes grow long, and the boobs overflow from their restrictive sheaths. For this night, tonight, is Halloween.

The whore-for-Halloween thing is something that puzzles me because I both totally get it and totally don’t.

As have we all, I’ve heard the argument that it’s about ‘indulging your fantasy’, ‘being daring’ and ‘letting go of your inhibitions’. (All of which sounds like the introduction to a tantric-sex class). But this means that in essence, on Halloween girls use this ‘excuse’ to suit up like the stripper they wish they were deep down inside.

Here’s the thing I don’t get. If you’re going to use Halloween as an excuse to dress provocatively, there’s good odds that you do so the other 104 weekend nights of the year. I mean let’s be serious. If a girl isn’t comfortable showing some skin when the club calls for it, there’s no ‘excuse’ that’s going to prompt her to suddenly break out a bustier.

I think there’s something fantastically fun and even sexy about having a night where you can wear literally anything you want, but I question the notion that what girls really want is to look like whores, especially when it’s pretty socially acceptable to do that any other day.

I’d much rather dress up like something I have absolutely nothing to do with. Last year my friend and I went as Wayne and Garth. In high school a bunch of us went as Newsies. Two years ago I really wanted to be a dragon, wearing a full green body suit and putting spikes down my back but I couldn’t find the equipment. Those things are FUN, and they’re funny, and they take advantage of the ‘excuse’ in a way that I actually enjoy because I don’t get to dress up like any of those things any other time during the year. I can always dress up like a hoe.

To that end, I have skirts in my closet that I’m pretty sure don’t cover my whole ass, which I wear when I want to look like a skank. I know what I’m doing; sometimes it’s fun, and wearing them is putting on a costume just as much as wearing a dinosaur suit would be.

I guess the difference is that, no matter what, I’m not really a dinosaur, but I could really be a skank. Which means that dressing up like a slutty nurse is indulging a hypothetical more than it is creating pure fantasy.

But whose hypothetical? Not to go all feminist on the issue, but these girls are clearly indulging the male fantasy that every female they encounter just might be a dirty sex goddess underneath it all. Or, in this case, underneath not-so-much. I have never been to a doctor’s office, police station, or school and been overcome with the desire for one of the authority figures there to immediately disrobe. Nor do I harbor the secret desire to let my inner bad girl out. And that’s because she’s already out when I want her to be, not when a holiday gives me an ‘excuse’.

I guess my PSA point is: do what you want! And enjoy it, but call it what it is. Being sexy isn’t limited to Halloween, and it definitely shouldn’t be purchased from Wal-Mart. Boys will think you’re hot whenever you project hotness. How often do you get to dress like a dinosaur?

(Can you guess what costume I’m wearing?)

Happy Halloween!

Closet Liberated

A couple of weeks ago, a miracle occurred: I got a job. This is exciting for many reasons, not the least of which is that now my fantasies no longer include embarking on a traveler’s quest to Peru, where I will dress in coco leaves and become impregnated by a man named Javier.

Additionally, it means I have to/ get to get dressed every day. This, friends, is a revelation.

For months (months!) my beautiful, plentiful professional clothes have hung silent and neglected in my closet. Accumulated over years of careful planning, meticulously preserved during moves both physical and professional, I have stacks of skirts and sweaters and jackets that have been periodically perfect when my life has called for me to pull it together.

Until recently, this had not been the case.

As a teacher, it does not behoove one to wear a silk skirt when one’s planned activities include making monster eyes out of egg yolk. As a server, the Uniform of Shame is a dictated monstrosity, and thank God for it because who wants to ruin their polos and their reputation. And last summer, my hideous pay-for-booze job essentially required me to wear tomato stains on a daily basis. It should go without saying that the tomatoes were probably worth more than the clothes I chose to go under them.

And so now it is with the greatest of pleasures that I have been dressing for a proper, civilized, highly visible and fashion forward position. The job is at an (The!) art museum, and so I have taken it upon myself to dress as if I were a part of the collection. Draping. Dresses. Hair. Heels. I want to look like a Vogue spread of Museum Girls at Work. Is this ridiculous? Probably. Do I give a crap? Absolutely not.

I am of course aware that to actually clad myself in period dress would be a touch too costumey, but I finally have the opportunity to dress like the highbrow art snob I have always pretended to be. Among my coworkers, I am not the only one to take this approach, but in general they lean more towards art-student-formal than art-patron-professional, which is the look I’m going for. And I’m sure there are some eye-rolls at the parade of blazers I have launched since I started work, but I’m refusing to tone it down. And why should I?

After all, when surrounded by such monolithic beauty, I feel it would be an affront to exclude myself from it. I mean, I live for this! My closet collection began long before I had an occasion to display it. And the closet liberation has been something I’ve been anticipating for years. It’s only now that it isn’t ridiculous that I have a blazer collection. I’m not getting paid nearly enough to go buy 12 designer blazers, but luckily, I’ve spent 10 years hoarding them. What I’m grateful for is that they’re already ready to go.

It’s probably insane that I’ve spent the time and money I have accumulating clothes before they had a purpose, but I guess I was putting faith in the future, as it were, and finally (finally!) the time for personal presentation is upon me. And every day, it feels fucking great to get dressed.