I’m not feeling Halloween this year…

Usually, I love Halloween. But this year? No. I look at the bones in the stores.. and I cringe. The fake pumpkins, the “costumes”… and I see consumerism running amok.

I see the bones of the Holocaust as I read about children in cages. More and more and more children in cages. And I can’t escape the bones of the people who have died to try to escape to a “city on a hill” that is in danger.

I see a “sexy Handmaids Tale” costume as an abuser is sworn into the highest court in the land, and women’s anger is framed as a “partisan divide”.

I see our country skirting closer and closer to destroying the entire world, not just our country… with a willful denial of climate change. As we hit 80 degree days in October in New England.

I see “seasonal candy” made just for the holiday, packaged in little plastic bubbles…

I see SO MUCH PLASTIC. Allergies? Plastic toys. We have to keep the kids safe! (The white kids, of course..god forbid anyone bring little POC kids into safe white suburbia)

I just feel so much everyday horror at the blind navigation of everyday things. At so many people remaining blind, willfully, to the systematic destruction of our everyday lives.

I look at the fake bones, and I just see real ones this year.

I used to love Halloween. I really did.

I wish we could all make one change. Maybe one street says “I’ll give out homemade treats this year”, or we make our own Halloween decor.

(The reason I say homemade treats? The waste involved with “seasonal candies”. Did you know the unsold candies are used to feed cows? With the wrappers on. Plus the energy used to make them, plus the ingredients, plus the child labor often involved with the chocolate harvesting.)

It won’t stop the horror of the camps. But it will do something small to alleviate the waste of the season.

*sigh*