As I peruse the markets and stores on an early August afternoon, the signs are already there. Earlier than ever. Black-and-orange knicknacks line the aisles of every home decoration store. The annual supply of animated ghosties and ghoulies already on display in the home improvement stores. Pumpkin beers already on grocery store shelves. Pumpkin Spice everything! Halloween is here, whether we like it or not.
For me, it's "not." It's just the middle of August. We're still deep in the throngs of summer. Heat and sunshine. Beach vacations, ice cream, and amusement parks.
I'm definitely not ready for the annual metamorphosis into the Halloween season quite yet. Every year, it starts a little earlier. We talk about the horrors of "Christmas Creep" and now I see my beloved Halloween holiday succumbing to the same fate. The magic of the season continues to be diluted in a rush to get the goods on the shelves to attract that almighty dollar...
Halloween illustrator/artist Sam Heimer recently summed it up perfectly in an absolutely brilliant Instagram post, so I'll just share his thoughts as they echo mine (but in a much more eloquent tone!).
From his Instagram post:I know it’s early to be posting this; let me tell you why. As I sit here on my stoop, face melting into my coffee and rivulets of sweat running from my pits into my jeans like tiny cricks fit for minnow fishing, yes, I yearn for the crisp breeze of autumn. Remember when we were kids and there was no mention of Halloween till the last week of September? No talk of Yule till the Thanksgiving china was tucked back in the hutch for their yearly nap? But I’m sweating through my underwear and Homegoods already has Jackolanterns on their shelves, Michaels is stocking skull cake pans. Do I want it? Yes. Is it time? No. I know I’ve said “I don’t view Halloween as a day, but the annual ebb and flow of a grand tide”, but we’ve lost the importance of wanting, of yearning, the solemn days of longing. The wait that makes the arrival, the embrace, all the more incredible, fulfilling, impactful. The relief after long agony. The rest after long days of toil. The arrival of Autumn, of Halloween, should be hauntingly whispered in your ear by the rustling of leaves, announced by a spice-tinged whisper of smoke aloft on a chill that makes you tug at your jackets lapels, the kind of chill that’s like a finger of bone just ran up your spine to a few xylophone notes. Little reminders you’re on the right side of the dirt. A fitting entrance, both loud and quiet at the same time, beautiful yet grim. Not slowly slogging into view with pit and boob sweat, flecked with mosquito bites and sunburn. It’s not time. And not because of a date, not because I’m bucking against big box stores trying to scratch an itch that will spread like poison ivy if disturbed. We simply are not ready. We haven’t earned it. We haven’t yearned long enough or hard enough, the fields are still ripe, the trees are still green. If you want to eat this half-baked cake, who am I to stop you, but I promise, if you hold on, wait just a little longer to cross through that orange and black transom, it will be all the more magical, cathartic, and earned. Come back to me in a few months and I will wish you a hearty Happy Halloween, but until then, please refill the fucking ice-cube trays.
Amen.
Rest assured my transformation is coming, as it always does. But let's enjoy the last of these summer days and save the anticipation for those magical, chilly autumn nights for just a bit longer. I will continue to hold out on the full-blown Halloween spending frenzy for another couple of weeks, and slowly let my excitement and manic, all-encompassing enthusiasm build as we begin our final approach to All Hallows Eve.
