As evidenced by my blog over the years, I love Halloween. I have a variety of costumes stashed away at home: Jedi (or Sith?), pirate, a low-effort Waldo, Doc Brown, and perhaps my favorite, Dread Pirate Roberts. There are many others, and I keep all the accoutrements in bins so I can pull them out when needed.
This year, we’re serving a mission and of course I didn’t bring costumes to El Centro. When we realized we’d be attending not one but two Halloween parties on the same night, I wondered what I might use for a costume. We trucked over to our local Spirit Halloween store, but the selection didn’t inspire me. The pineapple hat just seemed… off.
And the chicken hat didn’t inspire me either.
In the end, I bought a fancy top hat: the sort of thing Uncle Pennybags (of Monopoly fame) would wear. Yet it didn’t feel quite right, and we ended up attending the parties dressed as… missionaries. To be fair, that very morning our mission leaders had stressed to all the young missionaries in San Diego that costumes aren’t appropriate for the representatives of the Lord. Although as senior missionaries we don’t have the same rules, we felt like we should be examples. Sigh.
That was last night. Tonight was Halloween proper, and since the temperatures are dropping into the mere 80s, we thought it would be nice to go on an evening walk.
We learned that in El Centro, the people passing out candy set up chairs and tables in their driveways, and just sit outside in the nice weather to greet the trick-or-treaters. How awesome!
So, sadly, it wasn’t a “true” Halloween for me. But next year the costumes will be back.
Oh, and I fully expect that at least one of my offspring will take the pineapple or chicken photos and use them for nefarious purposes…