Mustering the energy to pull off Halloween was challenging. The stress of staying up to date with best practices at work, creating and modifying safety protocols and dealing with negative reactions from the customers and employees alike, the stress of managing two children's distance learning, worries about the local and national elections, fears about the crumbling of democracy and whether there would be a peaceful transfer of power, social injustice and civil unrest and the erosion of faith in media, the ongoing lack of certain supplies in the grocery stores, and the lack of social activity and fun adventures has taken it's toll on me. Fortunately the boys were able to start flag football in early October, and then started in person classes at their schools in mid-October. That gave me just enough hope and energy to decorate and plan.
Tyler opted not to dress up for Halloween, stating he was "going as myself." Tyrien on the other hand, did want to dress up. I searched for costumes for him online, and finding nothing, finally relented and, masked and sanitized, brought him into a Halloween store to figure out what he really wanted to dress as. Normally, we don't do store bought ready made costumes, but it's a pandemic. I didn't want to be entering multiple thrift shops to try to put something original together. At the Spirit store, it became clear what he really wanted to dress as was Pikachu. However, they didn't have a costume in his size, so I ordered one online.
Not only did we pull it off, I rallied the team to record us singing "Happy Birthday" to our medical director. I sent it to her via email, with a message intended to alarm her, "We hope you will give this matter the attention we feel it deserves." Despite being off for her birthday, the email triggered enough concern that she opted to open it immediately, and wrote back to us that the video made her laugh and cry. Mission accomplished!
Procrastination in full gear, I didn't place Tyrien's costume order until Tuesday, October 27th. We didn't buy pumpkins until Thursday, October 29th. There were hardly any pumpkins left, only huge ones and tiny ones. Tyson was horrified to see the sheer size of the pumpkin I bought for him! Yet somehow, we scraped together enough energy to carve the pumpkins.
Tyson and Tyler both refused to leave the house, while Tyrien wanted to try trick or treating. I attempted to fashion Kylo into a mutant Spider-Dog, and we set off to walk the streets, looking for houses that might be safely participating in trick-or-treating. I had seen on Nextdoor that some homeowners planned to sit outside and give out treats. We found none of them. The one house that looked promising, the homeowners COVID-shamed us, saying "We are actually trying to RESPECT the pandemic by not handing out candy." I am sorry to say that this made me feel incredibly angry. Yet compassionate and understanding at the same time. They had no idea that I have not missed a single day of work since the pandemic started. They had no idea the sacrifices I, my team, and my family have made to try to reduce the burden on hospitals and decrease the risk that the people we serve would experience exacerbated symptoms, verbal or physical abuse, hospitalization, incarceration, suicide, or homicide. That the protocols can work. They had no idea that I was looking carefully for safe trick or treating options. But we found no options at all. Feeling dejected, we headed home.
Upon arriving home, Tyrien was then able to search our yard for the glowing ghosts that contained candy. And Tyson's jack-o-lantern provided the validation I needed to feel at that exact moment.
FAH-Q 2020!
