Making a holiday about
suspense more suspenseful
People
always count the days until Christmas, but Halloween is the one day on
the calendar that's really about suspense and surprises.
First of all, there's an element of suspense about the costumes.
I make it policy that no one knows what we're going to be for
Halloween. None of my friends are told. Even the people at
the costume shops are never told the big picture, just whatever
isolated element we are looking for at that moment. Our costumes
are a secret right up until the Halloween party, even if I had the idea
literally years in advance (which is often the case). It's always
a surprise when we show up (or guests show up). I don't even post
pictures until Halloween is completely over with and we aren't going to
wear them anymore.
But it's decorating that I make into a fun game. I try to make
the build-up suspenseful for everyone watching what I'm going to put
out each year. I always think of the process of decorating my
yard for Halloween as a sort of unveiling. Sure, it might be
funny to put all the decorations up in the middle of the night and
surprise everyone with them the next morning, but it's much more
interesting to have some suspense to it.
I don't like it when people start too early decorating thing, but
conversely, I don't like it when folks wait until literally a day or
two before xmas before they put the tree up. To me that seems
wasteful since it's there and gone in a matter of a week. I
always think of xmas being a countdown until an event. If you
shorten that, you've taken away from the build-up. For me,
Halloween starts October 1st and continues through November 1st.
When October hits, that's the day start to dole out the scary.
First I'll set up the old, crooked Halloween fencing in the front
yard. The next day I hang some crooked shutters on the face of
the house. Some gravestones appear in the yard the day after
that, then ghosts in the trees, and so on. I have enough stuff
that I can literally do somewhere close to 30 days worth of setting
things out.
When there's thirteen days left, that's when it's time to bring out the
Halloween Countdown Clock. In addition to counting down the days
(and nights) until Halloween, I also swap the arms on it over the
course of those two weeks, such that there is a little surprise there
for those who are paying attention.
Every day I put out something more, something extra. Things get
layered until there's a yard full of decorations. It's fun
because it keeps the kids on the block checking it all out every day to
see what's new. Suspense builds, and the anticipation of the
event becomes an eveny unto itself.
Copyright
2011
the Ale[x]orcist.
