When I was
a kid living in Montreal, what you wore at Halloween was serious business. In
fact, just a slight orange or yellow tinge on a single leaf would spark the
start of my annual costume obsession. I’d spend weeks imagining my perfect get-up,
days talking about it at school, and hours trying to talk my parents into
buying exactly what I wanted.
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| The Scream Mask Shawn bought in the 90's |
My mother
often opted to hand-sew our outfits, which I hated. All I wanted was the same
store-bought ensembles my friends had, but in my mother’s eyes, mass production
just wasn’t good enough for her children. She also had the same opinion when it
came to candy – look! Home-made peanut
butter cups! Freshly baked chocolate chip cookies! – which is where we drew
a firm line. Our friends deserved real
candy… the store bought kind made with 4 different types of sucrose and 6
different kinds of additives.
The only
hand made item I proudly endorsed was my trick-or-treat bag. Unlike other kids,
I learned very early on that a novelty pumpkin basket or plastic Halloween bag
wasn’t going to suffice. If I had any hope in taking this trick-or-treat
business seriously, I would need a double-woven cloth bag. Like a pillowcase.
“Don’t!
What are you doing? Lift, Tara, lift!” my dad would scream, as I’d drag my
candy-laden pillowcase along the sidewalk.
