Scary, sexy, silly, sassy… funny, punny, outrageous… it’s all on display in wholehearted fun at the Village Halloween Parade.
The parade is legendary, but despite my enthusiasm for costumes, parades and people, I had never been. Until last week that is.
Last year I spent a brilliant Halloween weekend in San Francisco, complete with uber-cool pals — the legendary Tigger and friends, almost non-stop partying and a city that gets into the halloween act in its entirety. And so I wondered, how would this year shape up?
Just fine, thank you. It was low on the party scale, but high on the parades. Because instead of merely joining the thronging thousands on the sidewalks to witness the fun go by, Jay and I got in on the act, literally, donned costumes and took to the streets as part of the parade. (The official estimate for this year? 2 million people in and watching the parade!)
Which means we got to keep company of a couple dressed as a lock and key (the male key counterpart was way too into demonstrating the concept); a flock of mad, birdlike creatures whose wearers were ignorant of the liability-inducing capability of the numerous sharp sticks of their costume; a pair of loudly cheered gay super heroes (yes, yes, Calvin Klein or Xist would have been proud to see underwear worn with such pride, gay or otherwise); and a lone woman in 3 inch heels, blissfully flashing her scantily clad self. Ah yes, we were in the best of New York company.
So what did we wear? Jay was down in Miami Cuban style, complete with Guybera, Panama hat, shades and sandals (thankfully the day was a freak warm one!). I reprised my costume from last year — Gothic-styled red top with three foot drop velvet sleeves, floor length bleck dress… but this year added a three foot red wingspan in the form of wings. Couldn’t say what I was ‘supposed to be,’ but hey, I’ve always wanted to try out wings :0)
And that didn’t stop someone — in fact a purposefully, bedraggled peacock with a pro-evironmental message taped to her rear end — from coming up and saying, “Since when does Arwen have wings?”
That made my year — since last year I toiled to make my Arwen costume (sans wings) and spent the evening explaining it. (Note to self: Halloween costumes aren’t successful if they are from movies yet to be released. Unless you’re partying with folks who are dedicated fans.)
So it was immeasurably rewarding to know that someone recognized it immediately. And along with that, a second highpoint was the little girl who spent a few blocks dragging her mother to run after us to have a photo taken with me. Cool!
Now, what will I ‘be’ in 2005?
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