My name is Devan, and I’m a Halloween addict.
While that statement is a slight exaggeration, it isn’t far from the truth. Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. It is much more than a day, week or even a month to me.
I am one of those people who begins thinking about the next Halloween the morning after all of the festivities have died down. That’s normal, right? I mean, everyone has a costume they think up in advance but then they find a better one as the holiday approaches.
But this goes further than that. When I signed the lease on my house in February, I began planning our Halloween bash in my head. I could instantly picture the decorations around the house and potential costumes I could see my friends in this year.
Some people spend time on Pinterest and Tumblr; I prefer searching for Halloween costumes and ideas online in my free time.
Television in general also is grounds for the never ending search for the perfect Halloween costume. The pool of ideas that stem from TV shows, news and viral YouTube videos has me always thinking of costumes I have to see this year. Although it hasn’t happened yet, I’m determined to see someone dressed as Psy, who most people know from his “Gangnam Style” hit.
May was when I began thinking seriously about my Halloween costume. This year, I managed to not look at any Halloween costumes online until the Fall Semester actually began. I’ve learned how to keep myself controlled for a while.
By the time the first week of September passed, I was in full force search for my own Halloween costume. I can confidently say I have had at least one night a week spent online looking at the same costumes on websites for three or four hours at a time.
Luckily, my best friend is on the same page as me when it comes to Halloween for the most part, so she contributes to and puts up with my constant rambling about costumes.
I had a costume idea locked down with six weeks to spare until Halloween, and I felt like that wasn’t early enough. The past two years, I’ve had my Halloween costumes decided and the appropriate attire for my Marilyn Monroe and 50’s housewife costumes ordered with at least two full months to spare.
I’ve been to both Halloween City and Party City in town six times each. I usually don’t buy anything from stores like that, but I love helping my friends pick out their costumes.
Women’s costumes, men’s costumes, sexy costumes, scary costumes, crude costumes — I love them all.
Basically, I’m obsessed. I don’t understand how some people blow off Halloween as a fake holiday. It is an opportunity to be someone or something else for a week or two, depending on how long you stretch out the holiday.
Since I didn’t use a wig for my 1950s housewife last year, I spent hours before doing my hair as time appropriately as I could and putting on makeup, which I never wear. My attitude has always been about if you’re going to be someone else, why half-ass it?
I’m nervous that I have to get ready, help my friends get ready and decorate my house all after my class ends — that only gives me six hours.
We deal with the regular stresses and bores of real life everyday. I’ll be Adele this Halloween with a bad British accent and a cigarette hanging out of my mouth. Take a night or two this holiday and become someone else. You deserve it.
Devan Filchak is a junior journalism and telecommunications major and writes ‘Living and Learning’ for the Daily News. Her views do not necessarily agree with those of the newspaper. Write to Devan at dfilchak@bsu.edu.
