Jawas are stupidFor the most part the change I have gone through is subtle enough that I don’t notice. I can remember back to my youth. But those memories are through current eyes and I’m certain the tone and meaning of what I originally experienced is lost. However there was one point in my life where the change from child to adult was as sudden as falling off a waterfall. One moment I was a child, the next I acquired the shame of an adult.
Every year I loved to dress in a stupid costume and go out with my parents on Halloween to knock on doors and get candy.
“Oh how cute” they would say. “What are you supposed to be?”
I don’t even remember what any of the costumes were, which is probably for the best. I’m still waiting for my parents to break out the big book of pictures compiled for the sole purpose of embarrassing me in front of my friends. The one that shows me demolishing my first birthday cake or my silly Halloween costumes or me naked in any number of exposing poses, but it never comes. It’s odd that my snap shot memories are mostly based on sit-com sociology rather than physical proof. Regardless either the pictures don’t exist or they have been lost in the many moves and moldy sheds. There are a few pictures I have seen. One my girl friend has. A stunning image of a person I don’t recognize at age five-ish, then a few more school-picture-day photos of some more people that resemble me, but I don’t recognize.
The memory of my changing needs no image to recall.
One year I got all dressed up in my costume. It was a Jawa from Star Wars. I made the cloak myself and had these cool yellow sunglasses with red LED’s in the middle of each lens and it looked pretty cool in the dark with the hood up. Now that I think back I remember as I made the costume something felt different but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Like I was nervously waiting for something but I didn’t know what it was. Anyway on the big night I got dressed and set out with my dad down the mostly darkened street. But instead of walking up the steps to the first lit porch I stopped. Suddenly for the first time in my life I felt that what I was doing was silly and embarrassing. Not just any something, but the same something that I had been doing every year since I was three. But this year instead of walking to the door and claiming my candy I turned to my dad and said.
“This doesn’t feel right anymore.”
We turned towards home and walked back in silence. I never went trick-or-treating again.
Looking back it must have been a profound moment for my dad. How many fathers get to actually see their son shed the ideals of a boy. Witness a sudden shift in personality as the Jawa suit is discarded and left lying in the warm October air in front of the first door.
I’ve often relived the experience and asked myself the same questions. What changed? Why was it that the year before it was fun to trick-or-treat. Something that I looked forward to and was excited about, then 365 days later the same activity felt uncomfortable and unnecessary.
For every measurable change, how many have occurred without notice? Can I ever really compare my current mind to that which existed as a child? I remember that night I was a little fearful of the sudden change, but relieved that I didn’t have to dress up in a silly costume and walk around hearing people say. “Oh how cute.” And “What are you supposed to be?”
I don’t have the answer, although I’m certain it has something to do with sex.
Devious Comments
Well hmm. I don't think I have ever heard of you talking about this nor about the pictures I now will have to ask your parents about
I can see some one feel that way. Out growing their toys or clothes or anything really. I think it's just time & your brain allowing more change to occur. We never cared how we dressed when we were kids. Also long as we had clothes on & got out side right? Now we wonder if our hair is ok, do these pants go with this shirt & most of all, do I have a pimple?! OMG.
I have to say you really didn't grow out of Halloween per say. I see it more as a new step in the world of events. You want to dress up for Ren-Faire & for the Halloween party I had. You buy the food & candy then go & wander the dark streets for it. You scare the kids (maybe you don't but some people do) then being the one getting scared by some jerk heh. I guess I am trying to say is, if we didn't change even with a holiday like Halloween who would give out the candy if we all stayed the trick-or-treaters? Some one has to say "Oh how cute" or "What are you supposed to be" right?
Maybe I'm just being silly.
I can see naked pictures of you? Cool.
You already have but the pictures I think of my in a young age aren't naked. If I remember right. Oh wait I think there may be a few of me like at the age of 2 running around after bath time.
For one, I stopped going trick-or-treating when someone refused to give me candy because I was "too big" to go. I believe the last time I went was with Amber..and I was like 15 or 16. It was fun. Then the years of passing it out came...and I just hate passing it out....I tend to sit there and eat a whole bag myself...it's really bad. Trick-or-treating gives you exercise, free candy, the freedom to knock on stranger's doors and be anonymous WITHOUT getting in trouble...it's great. I am looking forward to taking Bethany from door to door in some cute costume or another. She will not question these rituals until she's at that "why" stage, where everything is answered with "Why?" and if you say "Because, it just is", she'll no longer accept that. Sometimes "why?" isn't an easy question to answer. It's easier to ask it, however.
As for watching your child shed their childhood, every day Bethany does something new. I am watching her slowly "shed" her infancy and day-by-day, she is one step closer to crawling, walking, talking and doing all the neat things that babies start to do within one year. She is getting so big...she smiles and laughs now. I get frustrated, she knows it and she laughs about it. My baby has a sense of humor and understanding far beyond what people actually think. I think John is unaware of this at the moment, and it won't be fully articulated until she's old enough to emote to him, BUT I can see it clearly. I'm her mother. I seem to have this psychic connection with her. She's frustrated, she's crying to me, and it's kind of like I can hear what she's saying. Her voice, the pitch of her cries, her body language and even the look in her eyes tell me everything I need to know. It's sort of like reading braille with your eyes...it's hard to see, but it's there.
What changed was you. People change everyday...new ideas are created and thought patterns change course. It's easy to say "I don't want to have kids" when you're in your 20's and early 30's, but when you get to that point, it's like you have to have kids. My biological clock started ticking two years ago. It was sudden. One day, I woke up and said "I need to have kids soon. I don't have much time left." It's the same. One day, you started puberty. You don't exactly remember when probably, and yeah this goes back to sex of course, but you started growing hair. You got the vocal change...sometimes it's still there when you have a frog in your throat...your genitals changed and you started feeling that hormonal impact where you just had to relieve yourself of the collection in your scrotum...it's natural. It just had to happen. One day, you just decided that trick-or-treating didn't feel right....how old were you? Age has everything to do with it. Every age your thought processes progress, every year what was cool then seems stupid now....I had L.A. Gear high tops, long frizzy fluffy hair, curly bangs and I always wore spandex pants under these pretty dress-like shirts. That was sixth grade...I was cute back then, but I wouldn't be caught dead in that crap today. Times change, people change, and it's the natural evolution of things.
You question it too much, I think...maybe you only learn certain things through experience and I think being a new parent, I can safely say your kids grow too fast. It happens quick and it happens right before your eyes....your dad probably thought it was just another change in your personality like going from an infant to a toddler to a child to a young man. It was just as significant as every other change in your life...like learning how to potty on the toilet and then later demanding privacy on the toilet from the same person who has wiped your genitals your entire life so you wouldn't get an infection, rash or any crazy disease. Amazing, isn't it?
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