All Hallow's Eve

-Don’t keep the light off and hide in the back of the house; face the little monsters

-Give real candy; no apples, popcorn balls, dum-dums, sugarless/healthy garbage or other lame stuff, and remember that there’s nothing fun about the fun size

-Give the hobos (the teenagers that shouldn’t be trick or treating- often dressed as "hobos") whatever they want, though you don't want to; they’re scary

-Half price candy tomorrow! Don’t wait or you’ll be left with only candy corn.

Behind the Brown Door

Faculty doors: more communicative than you might think. The more the door is open, the more the faculty member is willing to talk to you. When the door is wide open, it means come on in, but when it's open just a crack, it means I'm pretty busy and I'd rather not be bothered, but come in if it's really important. When the faculty door is shut, it may be like the house with front light off on Halloween. S/he may be in, but may be pretending not to be in order to avoid students/trick-or-treaters. Of course, it is always OK to knock, but s/he may or may not answer.

Fortunately, many faculty put students first and put down whatever they are doing to talk to students. We are lucky to have a lot of those here. But then there are some others.

Lastly, when in the office, don't shut the door, and open the door if the other closes it without an apparent and good reason. From the faculty member's perspective there is a problem, at best something personal to you, that is going to make him/her uncomfortable, and at worst, provide you an opportunity to do something bad, or maybe the opportunity to later claim that the faculty member did something bad. Much the same applies for the student as well, especially relating to sexual harassment. Don't close the door. For any students reading this, faculty are almost always wearing the white hats, but faculty have the power, and power corrupts. For any faculty reading this, it's 999/1000 that there won't be a problem, but you're going to see a thousand students in your career.

Dress for Success

Erik makes a great point in commenting on the last blog. To riff on that, there should be a law against dressing kids and animals as props. We are not talking about dressing a child responsibly, as wearing a coat when it's cold or not wearing underwear as outerwear for school. We are talking about the whimsical and capricious practices of dressing children for essentially entertainment purposes. It's one thing if your kid asks to play, but to compel your child to participate in your game is selfish and disrespectful. Unfortunately there is not a license required to be a parent, and that's good for you "creative" kid dressers, as you would have never gotten past the written.

Maybe it's an assumption that the child will of course share your interest in the Battle of Chickamauga and of course enjoy the reenactment experience. More likely, your child loves to be with you, so why not do something s/he likes? I'm not sure that Civil War reenactment and learning the finer points of weaponry qualify as "quality time."

Or maybe it's a generous act of sharing, as who wouldn't want to engage in a rousing game of Dungeons and Dragons? No criticism for the motive, but don't be too disappointed if the little one doesn't want to be the Half-Elf Druid Vadania (of course I just looked that up; have no idea what it means, but who would admit to knowing?).

Or maybe it's educational in expanding their horizons, as action role playing is a good learning experience. But while you might enjoy and learn from being a jester in a medieval faire or one of the undead in the Kings of Chaos, odds are your child would prefer to play in Toontown or on Webkinz and will probably learn as much or more there. And what prompts someone to want to cultivate another generation of vampire slayers? Just stick to your Second Life and leave the kids alone.

And one last thing on this. It's not cute to dress up your kid as a little version of you. Simply stated, it's somewhere between creepy and mean. Don't saddle your children with your own insecurities. Let them develop their own identities. (Do you hear that those of you that name your kids "juniors?" George Foreman- five kids named George?)

As for dressing pets, that an easy one. Don't do it; it's stupid. I guarantee kitty is not going to enjoy her adorable Halloween costume, and it's selfish and insensitive of you to dress up a pet. I believe that many animals have feelings of some sort. I'm not sure if embarrassment is one, but put the pup in a Yoda costume and you'll find out. And stop with the sweaters; they're dogs, they can take a 10 minute walk in 30 degree weather. Yes, there are exceptions, as some dogs are old, arthritic, short-haired, etc. If it is truly functional, fine, but the pooch doesn't need to make a fashion statement. It's silly.

Pretty dogmatic on this one, but it's just a blog.

Dress Up

Having just gone through the annual and expensive Halloween costume hunt, it is hardly a novel thought that this Halloween thing is out of hand. Yet the let's pretend occasion is fine and even fun, even if there is too much of a hey-look-at-me aspect to it and though adults won't let it be just for kids the way it should be (and once again, 12 should be the cut-off age for trick-or-treating. Please, no more teenagers that I have to give candy to because I'm afraid they'll slash my tires if I don't.) It's the costumes beyond Halloween that have me wondering.

I guess there's a self-selective aspect for those that choose professions with particular types of costumes or uniforms (for example, I wear a suit most work days, clearly a costume), but there seems to be a line between work and play somewhere beyond which people choose to dress up more for their own entertainment, often with the illusion that they do it mainly to entertain others. Sadly, others are rarely entertained.

Why do people dress up as clowns, for example? Nobody really likes clowns, and in fact I recently learned that there is a word for the apparently common fear of clowns: coulrophobia. Closely related are mimes, possibly the most despised of all "entertainers." There's nothing entertaining about these boring, self-absorbed attention "hounds" (there is another more descriptive word). And then there are the re-enactors, which add a special element of nerdom to the role-play. Whether it's Star Wars, medieval fairs, the Civil War, or whatever, you're just way too serious about that stuff. There are lots of people that like to play dress up, and most are harmless enough; it's just that these things should be done in the privacy of one's own home, and if others are involved, they should be consenting adults.

The disturbing exception may be those that cross-dress not as a lifestyle choice but as seemingly screamingly hysterical party behavior. What could be funnier than the macho guy dressed as the inevitably too-buxom woman? (Do you ever see drunken women dressing as men?) It's weird and it's dumb, but why is it so common amongst our beer-bellied brethren?

Finding Waldo

In the previous two posts, i.e., UBU and The Flip Side, the admittedly straw man argument was made to not try too hard to be an individual or to fit in, but just be yourself. While that may seem a trite sentiment (but I maintain an uncommon reality, especially for younger people), being yourself may not be so easy. Though we are the "land of the free and home of the brave," the proverbial "melting pot," we are not very well equipped for "different."

We like to think of ourselves as tolerant and accepting, but are we really? You think your friends are all unique, for instance, but I'll wager they are far more alike, and similar to you, than you think. Just how many 70 year old Japanese women do you hang around with anyway? No, we are generally more comfortable with the familiar, the similar. And further, we not only seek the similar, but will also, sometimes subtly, coerce others to be similar. Your parents raise you to conform to their standards, your friends shape you to adhere to their norms, the media influences you by portraying paragons of normality, businesses sell products to the fat part of normal curve in their target markets, institutions (like school, church, military, clubs, work, scouts, gangs, etc.) tell you how to behave and even think, and on it goes.

The generations coming up are even more greatly impacted by "groupthink," due at least partly, and paradoxically, to technology. Today I saw someone on a hand-held cellphone while on a bike. My kids, as early as 4 or 5 years old, were being trained to make friends and communicate with them on sites like Toontown, Webkinz, and others. Teens can't seem to go more than moments with texting. And yet, this increased socialization is shallow and sterile. It is ironic, and rather sad, I think, that one could spend so much time with others without being with them, and I am not referring to just a physical proximity.

It is interesting that as the East becomes more westernized in many ways, there is a corresponding shift in the West towards eastern attitudes regarding social processes. Fading is the notion of rugged individualism. High Noon has been replaced by Our Gang as a cultural attitude. For example, dating used to be a one-on-one process where one got to know another. Now, dating often begins in groups, where one gets to know several until another is selected and partially cut from the herd. While I do think there is some wisdom to this, it is a fundamental shift in how romantic relationships are formed. Where such groups are not accessible or satisfactory, "virtual groups" (Facebook, Myspace, etc.) may be formed, and enlisting the aid of match-making media is now an acceptable alternative.

Now with all these forces and more telling you who you should be, no wonder it is so hard to know who you really are.