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A crisp chill creeps into the air. Tombstones turn a darker shade of grey. Bags of teeth-rotting sweets infest the kitchens. Changing rooms become plagued with black. Coloured contacts soar off the shelves. Howls echo throughout the night.
  This all amounts to one conclusion; Halloween is upon us. Â
Whilst Halloween is fresh in our memory and the photos of us all dressed up are still coming up on our Facebook news feeds, Siobhan Lawless reflects on her Halloweens growing up and how they’ve changed over the years.
Origins
All Hallows Eve falls on the evening before All Saints Day. This day which honoured Christian saints and martyrs, was created by Christians in a sneaky attempt to convert pagans. All Hallows Eve festivities can be traced back to the Celtic holiday Samhain. This holiday fell on October 31st; it celebrated the end of harvest season and the beginning of winter.
The Celts believed on this night, that the souls of the dead wandered the streets. Thus, gifts were left out to pacify the evil spirits and guarantee another good harvest. Our modern day trick-or-treating, evolved from the Celtic practice called “souling.” Prayers were offered at each door in exchange for “soul cakes” and other delicacies. Maybe if we all bake a soul cake and say a prayer there is salvation for us all?    Â
Samhain- a surprisingly ordinary scene. If only by this time the costumes had caught on
Halloween in younger years
I can still stretch my mind back to being a doe-eyed six-year-old, glancing up expectantly at doorsteps. As my fellow trick-or-treaters and I wiggled our empty sweet bags in the wind.
Not until our bags were full with enough sugary sweets to almost send Haribo into liquidation, did we finally upon arrival home and have our fill. Really, who could refuse us? Expect for the most cold-hearted, to give treats to a hobbit sized pumpkin or a polly-pocket sized Dracula, whose milk teeth made their fangs look even more adorable by contrast? The innocence and cuteness of it all makes me sigh nostalgically. Equally, the elation at carving the pumpkin each year and watching it glow luminously seemed so magnificent that it was almost a supernatural occurrence itself.
How could you refuse?
Halloween growing up
Fast forward eight years when you’re taller and not so sweet and the frosty receptions at doors begin. I really can’t blame folk either; I would be pretty traumatised myself faced with six teen hags and demons cackling, giddy on E numbers. Who knows how many eggs they are clenching in their excitable claws? Now, older and wiser, I can safely say that when I was a young adolescent, I had my least enjoyable Halloweens. The stage when we finally gave up trick or treating, realising at our age we were like overripe pumpkins at harvest. So on Halloween all the girls grouped together and binged until we realised that we’d all have to purchase elasticised jeans the following day. We watched horror films, revelling at the thrill of watching an 18 before our time. On reflection, it was fairly tragic but at the time we thought it was a cackle.
In our pubescent minds, we were living the dream
Halloween as a student
Come the mid and late teens Halloween became, “the one night a year when girls can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it.” Boy, was Mean Girls spot on. Never, would you ever catch me in fishnets. Yet come Halloween, I’m hoisting them up as if it was only the most natural thing. However, the notion of dressing seductively should still be confined within its limits. Ironically, for a holiday which originally celebrated the end of summer, girls strut about in scraps of fabric so skimpy that it’s no wonder they don’t contract phenomena. “Are you being a mummy?” One might ask, genuinely believing this to be their tatters significance. The flat “No” which follows as a response is eerie to say the least.Â
Your worst nightmares confirmed
Then again, there is the pressure to dress in a sultry fashion. No one wants a real life reenactment of Cady strutting into the Halloween party literally looking like death and getting death stares from every other vixen. Every year I feel like moving away from the stock costumes- cat, vampire or ghoul. One day, I tell myself, I’ll opt for Freddy Krueger, Edward Scissorhands or Beetlejuice. However, just anticipate the Facebook photos. One eccentric Bellatrix Lestrange, sandwiched in-between half a dozen pouty kittens and vamps, is really less than ideal. If only I was a boy, sometimes I ponder, and then I could really go to town. Opting for a more toned down La Calavera Catrina, dressed in a fitted black cami and leggings, is an amiable option for being scary, but not terrifying.
After hours of vanity, fully dressed, the real amusement begins, celebrating Halloween as a student. These days really are my golden Halloween ones. The joys of being students with houses or accommodations mean parties can be thrown. Thank goodness also for a city which boasts so many clubs and various nights, leading up to and falling on Halloween. Everyone seems to be in high spirits and the surprise element of trick-or-treating is transferred to the guesswork of distinguishing friends with different eye colours and sporting absurd wigs. It is the one holiday spent with friends all under the same roof and probably what makes it one of my favourite celebrations besides Christmas.
So I hope you had a very happy Halloween with whatever tricks and treats you had up your sleeve.