My life in costumes: a retrospective

When it comes to Halloween, I'm an all or nothing girl. If nothing major is happening that year, I'm happy to do nothing; but in the years I do dress up, I'm usually remembered as the girl with the most random costume in the room.

In fourth grade, my mom, who is a gifted painter, took a plain cardboard box and turned it into a wearable, identical replica of a grape-flavored Hi-C juice box. At 9, no one had ever seen a costume that didn't come in a bag at K-Mart, and my legacy was born.

In sixth grade, I wanted to recreate the popularity of my fourth grade costume, so my mom and I raided the pantry for inspiration. Among all the canned goods and bags of rice, flour, and sugar, we settled on the biggest box in sight: Cat Chow. Yes, I was a box of Cat Chow that year. Because the box was long, not square like Hi-C juice boxes, it was incredibly difficult to walk in and trick-or-treat. And at 11, I had lost some of the cuteness that maybe helped me pull of the drink box two years prior.

My junior year of college I decided that, rather than be something specific, I would just wear all black and paint my face and body silver. What's more bizarre than the fact that I did this was that I convinced two friends to do it also. When people asked, we said that we were broken glass. (Which doesn't even make sense now that I'm sober enough to think about it.)

My senior year I wanted to continue down my path of non-specificness, and decided I would be a superhero. Only rather than commit to an existing superhero like Wonder Woman or Catwoman, I would be a "mystery" superhero. I had a black cape, black boots, and a Zorro-like mask, and cut a question mark out of some purple-sequinned material to pin on my chest. The costume looked great - sexy and powerful - or at least it would have if I hadn't suffered from a momentary bout of dyslexia and sewed the question mark on BACKWARDS (!!!)

Post-college, I discovered Ricky's, the New York beauty emporium/sex shop/drag den, and bought myself a pink wig for more money than I spent on the rest of my costume that year (black clothes that were already in my closet plus the cape from the year before). But that wig lasted me three years' worth of Halloweens and twice that many parties, until I lost it in 2002 after one too many bottles of Belvedere.

Halloween just hasn't been the same since.