When To Dress For Halloween? September. Freaking. First!

“Why, in a time when courage is measured by the grand deeds one undertakes, do we find ourselves timid in the face of a simple costume? Embrace the spirit of Halloween, for it is not merely a day for frivolity, but a reminder that in the heart of every grown soul should dwell the spirit of adventure and mirth. Do not be a specter of your own potential; let your imagination and audacity shine through the guise of the fantastic!

It is a lamentable irony that so many who profess to honor the grandeur of life are unwilling to engage in the simple act of celebration. How dare we refuse to dress up for Halloween, a day that invites us to embrace whimsy and joy! To shun such an occasion is to deny the very essence of what makes life precious. Our spirits are not so fragile that we cannot don a costume and revel in the mirth of the moment. If we are to cherish our days, let us do so with hearts unburdened by the weight of pretense and with a readiness to embrace the fleeting magic of life’s little celebrations!

Let us not squander the precious gift of life by withholding our joy; instead, let us adorn ourselves in the colors of festivity and let our laughter be the tribute to our shared humanity.”

-- Abraham Feline Lincoln

Ladies and Germtermen, you have a very few responsibilities in life.

Grow all the way up until you become a great being, don’t let people use you, or step on you, nor turn the other cheek.

Live long, look and dress beautiful, which is to say hard earned endurance fitness.

Become knowledgeable, intelligent, wise, free of delusion and fantasy, and learn to know what is truly important in life.

Finally, celebrate life, especially as you get older, because old age is a magnificent privilege denied... to many.

All things considered, there is just one beautiful Holiday, that isn’t about getting, or resting, or wanting…

But rather about who you really are, deep, down, within, with all your crushing weight and missed deadlines.

Who, you are, who, you, are.

Few weeks ago I was standing in a used clothing store, and a tall and heavy man next to me was looking at golf clubs.

I looked a the bin, that also contained baseball bats, hokey sticks…

And an inordinate amount of “Honey, I really need this club to improve my golf game” clubs.

And I said to the mature adult, did you used to watch Ninja Turtles, when you were a kid.

“A little” - he admitted, his eyes betraying that he thought I was a total wacko.

I pointed at the bin, and said, “that’s a Casey Jones armory”, now fully convincing him I am crazy.

But we both knew, that we gave up on something, important, and not because we wanted to.

Our vision of the world somehow became more rigid, our minds dumber – and we call it being an adult.

We gave up a stepping stone, a childhood dream of assembling an armory, or batman armor out of used crap, of learning to shoot bow and arrow.

We made the stepping stone meaningless, and that part of started withering away.

Let me explain to you what a stepping stone is, when the black iPad came out.

A video circulated the internet of an ungrateful young lady, who received the white version, and not the black one as she wished.

The special one, was her stepping stone, she was building herself together, with whatever she could find.

She needed the special one to step higher, to be heard, to have her unique wishes remembered.

To show her worthless friends, that she too can have special things that they all parade.

She wanted to be as good as the cool kids, and her parents took that one little step from her.

Today, as a grown woman, she looks back at that moment, fully convinced it was unimportant.

But take a closer look, the gadget was nice, but, the color mean even more.

It is because she was getting two gifts in one, a slow worthless gadget, and a moment of relief from being crushed.

From the psychological bullies in her clasroom, always showing off, what would have become their older models.

The color was the gift, she could rise above the people that always seem higher than her.

Wrong color, meant she would be kept down, she would have to find something else to rise with.

A very dangerous act, because that is an act, that may will eventually force one to give up.

It does not matter how high a person rises, to this lady, the right color was a small pebble.

What matters is the act of rising, and not being kept down.

Let me cut this explanation short, and say something that you shouldn't understand is all of this was wrong.

She was being pushed, to wear the same costume.

...

And not sticking out, is so dangerously pleasant.

Like a stoner, you will be 16 years old one day, and 68 the next.

Any act that causes hurt to a young person, is a terrible tragedy.

She wasn’t spoiled, she was crushed, and that color would help her rise.

Do you wear the same costume as everyone else? Or as some large group of other people?

Because your time is finite, you must not live and die like everyone else.

You don’t want to practice resignation, either, what you need is to bloom and flourish.

And to get there, you need everyone of your steps, because each time you miss one, you also miss where you are supposed to end up.

This part, of missing life, is best demonstrated, by those of us, who never give weight loos all we got.

Years ago, I saw a fat man with tears in his eyes, reveal how many hundreds of pounds of his body weight he lost, and still filed.

He didn’t rise, he stayed crushed, and like in eveyone else, there was nothing in him with which he could rise.

Because to wear the same costume as everyone else, is to be other than you really are – shifted out of yourself – empty.

Not hallow, but hollow.

Everyone of us is unique, and never, not once in all the history of the world, has a geek, a nerd, a freak, an office worker… ever existed.

Those are just brand names, groups for lonely people damned to wear the same costume.

And die in it, too.

I only understood that Halloween Eve starts Septemeber 1st, just now.

I thought I was doing pretty good, putting on my tail 5 weeks early – but I was actually almost a month late.

Every change you get, you must take, to show exactly what that young lady was trying to show.

I am unique, I am a saint, and no evil will keep me down.

Because in a compromise between good and evil, only evil can profit.

Please, like that young lady, you must rage against being forced to be like everybody else.

Epilogue

I stood there a little bit longer trying to gather courage, to buy the three baseball bats like Casey Nones surely would.

When I first got to the store I discovered one of the most important books ever written, “Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Super Athletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen”.

I was now hanging onto it, clutching it behind me.

When I tuned around to face the man, now quietly and somewhat desperately trying to escape.

I tried to tell him, he need this book, and he said, with a mangeled pride.

Nooks, is the one thing I don’t read and finally darted for the register.

I carried the book for 20 more minutes, hoping to find someone else to give it to.

I passed by strangers, they were all busy, and I ran out of words.

I put the book in a special place, where everyone could see it.

Whatever you do, take your steps.

However little or impossible, they may seem.

Because without your own path forward, you will shift out of your very own existence, long before your time is up.

My my words, when the Hallow turns mere hollow, even becoming an Ultramarathon runner.

Will only scratch the surface, of who you would have become, had you grown all the way up.

Mark my words, child.

You don’t have to wear a bunny suit, but you can’t wear a human suit.

Get a tail, or a pair of fluffy ears before September is up, and there will still be some hope for you left this year.

May 2025, marking 25 years from year 2,000, also mark September 1st, as the day you celebrate you for solid two months.

You must never forget to celebrate life, and may you never again be like anybody else.