Halloweens Past

Is it Halloween, or is it just us?

 Halloween seldom occurs on Saturday night, an evening when it seems so natural to let off some steam, to let our often-reserved working selves fly into the night. One year, the weather, the mood, the occasion all conspired toward party time. Our town loves Halloween, and parties run rampant crossing the borders of good taste and sense quite naturally. People have been known to wear their last night’s costumes to church, unwilling to let go of a joyous sense of the absurd.  Exotic and erotic benefit-balls, street strolling en famile, bike parades in costume, the naked pumpkin run, babies in the daylight, school shows. You know, rampant. This year, we were running along with them.

“Turn your head,” the man who has been over many years my lover, my friend, and my husband said to me,

“No, tilt it up, just a bit- umm,- no-too far, back a little, no, no, a little bit more to the left; ahhh, that’s right…” 

I sat there before him, as Lew held several small brushes in his hand, the small pots of color to his side. His hand shook, trembling just a little in excitement. I closed my eyes, waiting for the stroke that would begin my transformation, hoping that he wouldn’t be using his working paintbrush.

He put the cobalt blue on my right eyelid first, then backed away, surveying his work. Again, he prepared for his assault, equipment in hand, more confidently working with the left companion lid, although wincing when an inadvertent shaking of his hand caused a splotch to appear on my cheekbone, in blue.

Then came the blood red, a clown’s mouth. My made up face had been a ghastly stark white, over-layered in the middle of it, an oh-so-yellow circle. Now, a wide mouth  extended from my natural lip’s shape with a slight downward droop on the left, giving me a smile that swooped up to toward my nose, on the right. Although I was not symmetrical, I drooped only on the left side, hemispherical.

And so the make up session continued, far longer than it should, or maybe much shorter than desirable; the actual time not being clear. The first 15 minutes used up my patience, although I had to wait an hour before I could walk away. I dared not stare into a mirror. I turned my head just a bit, trying to watch his hands, measuring my reaction from the look on his face. Occasionally he would say, “Oh, sorry.”

I closed my eyes, knowing that he probably was. Sorry, that is, but not actually knowing what he should be sorry for. But I did know. I occupied myself for some time thinking of both small and major items in a totally particular, and personal  inventory of complaints, collected, and burnished over of the years of our togetherness.

He, on the other hand, carried on, as unflappable as though he was accomplishing what he had begun; a workmanlike concentration on his face, furrows deeply cut between his  brows, lining up perpendicularly to his blond and rather sparse eyebrows. I think that he was enjoying himself far too much.

“Where had his eyebrows gone” I pondered. He used to have eyebrows! I remember them, waving down at me like woolly caterpillars, tender look upon his face. Just now though, tender wasn’t the look that he was wearing. He seemed, well, there was no other word for it – he was amused! He was laughing at his work, his shoulders were shaking slightly and, he was laughing at – me!

That was, given our circumstances, worrisome.   Draped on the chair next, a full costume, emboldened by primary colors with dots, elephants, and various animals, royal blue on one side, and multiple figures on the other, in metallic gold. My headpiece sat on a polystyrene head a few feet away, it’s little beaded form light and quite bland, overlooking the set-up. Bright orange, it’s draping feathery, it always made me itch, although there was something sensuous about the way the individual feathers occasionally blew across my cheek and chin. I found the itch tolerable, perhaps because those wispy feathers felt just a bit racy and sexy. I toyed with some very un-clown like thoughts having to do with feathers. Unimportant, especially since no one but myself would later know who was under that costume. Anonymity is a terrific benefit to costuming, given the makeup. I deliberately turned my thoughts to the project at hand.

When finished, I stood there, finally with mirror in hand. I now was a clown all right, in white face, looking as though I had had a stroke while attending clown school; wearing a face designed by a schizoid… God, I thought. Never trust power run amuck. I sighed. After all that we had been through during our past difficult years, was this significant enough to disturb the delicate balance of a fun evening?  Or should we tilt full force into a party of maids, maidens, monsters, political statements, and a few very creative erotic possibilities? Some of those might later have also wished that they had given the evening second thoughts, or perhaps a bit more careful preparation.

Ah, at one time how I appeared would have been really important, but now – more pertinent, this year was more about presenting myself in trust and confidence to the man with the slightly shaky hand, knowing that the most important thing was whatever happens between the two clowns who would soon head out the door. Would our friends care? Perhaps they would not even notice, much.

A bit crooked, a bit overdone, certainly not pretty – rodeo clown perhaps. Reminder to self – keep safe distances from the crowd so that no one would notice the runny drip of green goo making its way down the side of the orange clown’s face.  That singular artistic stroke had started as a single dropped tear, but quickly became tear-tracks.

This was not our first dress up Halloween; it would perhaps not be our last. We began to head toward the car, white gloves in place, both wigs flinging feathers into the night air with each careless shake of a head. Although we were willing to show up without an artistically perfect Hollywood finish, some small bit of reluctance attended my thoughts, tugging at my pride, wishing to show up done well: I still wanted to look good, have it all together and be on top of the occasion. Sternly, I set myself to walking forward, one foot in humility, and one stuck in myself.

“Oh, shut up and just have a good time.” Perhaps one of our friends might find us amusing. I did, when I wasn’t obsessing about how bad I looked. One clown cobalt, the other orange; one clown sporting bits of jade green, with red dragons on the left, leg, right torso; the other a blue pattern alternating with an orange tessellation of turtles.  One tall and broad, the other, well – there is no other way to say it – short and broad, with a modern art face.

Just two imperfect clowns out on holiday…