Every year since my younger son Jack was three or so, we have tried on Halloween masks together. \u00a0It was always Jack’s holiday, the plans for some elaborate costume taking shape weeks in advance, the scarier the better. \u00a0When he was really young, he was happy to go trick-or-treating in whatever sweet little outfit I dreamed up for him–a tiny vampire, a tiger, a pumpkin. \u00a0But the age of innocence didn’t last long. \u00a0He wanted to be terrifying. \u00a0Whereas Henry was content to paw through a bag of cast off clothes or to grab an old dress out of my closet and stick a witch hat on his head at the last minute, Jack wanted a full-bore, frontal-assault sort of costume. \u00a0The kind that could not possibly be homemade, but absolutely had to be store-bought, preferably dripping fake blood. \u00a0He wanted a knife or a spear or a hatchet to carry, and would not be caught dead putting a jacket on over his black flowing garments, no matter how chilly Halloween night turned out to be. \u00a0The costume ruled.<\/p>\n
Yesterday morning, Jack and I set out early with a shopping list he’d made the night before–all the things he’s discovered he can’t live without these days. \u00a0Tea bags, boxes of cereal, Clearasil, a hot water heater. . . We were efficiently checking things off the list — until we found ourselves alone in the Halloween section of Walmart. It was hard to resist pausing to critique this year’s batch of outrageous masks. Jack pulled a clown mask over his head, and I slipped on a piece of zombie headgear, complete with creepy little arms dangling from the sides. \u00a0Pretty soon, we had tried on every mask on the shelf and contemplated a few mullet wigs as well.<\/p>\n
Last year at this time, Jack and I were pretty much at a stand-off with one another. \u00a0His sixteenth year hasn’t been easy for any of us, a time of tremendous growth and transformation, challenge and worry. We’ve fought about everything, had many intense heart-to-heart talks, and have worked hard over the last few months, each in our own ways, to find new, healthier ways to relate to one another. In a few weeks, he’ll turn seventeen. \u00a0He’s happy, doing well in school, nearly grown up. It is easy, once again, for us to enjoy one another’s company.<\/p>\n
Jack didn’t buy a mask for Halloween. \u00a0But our detour down the mask aisle brought back lots of good memories for us both. \u00a0I realize that what I remember most clearly now is not all the actual Halloween nights of his childhood, but rather our annual trips together in search of the perfect mask. \u00a0And how, year after year I, a fully grown woman, willingly tried on ghoul and ghost faces for my son. \u00a0How much fun we had together, when I wasn’t in a rush to get the job done, or to get somewhere else, but slowed down to his pace, and took the time to play and ponder. \u00a0That’s what we did yesterday. \u00a0It felt, for a few minutes, as if he were just a little kid again. \u00a0“We’ve always done this,” he said, as we left the Halloween aisle and headed off in search of batteries and earbuds. “Wouldn’t miss it,” \u00a0I answered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Every year since my younger son Jack was three or so, we have tried on Halloween masks together. \u00a0It was always Jack’s holiday, the plans for some elaborate costume taking shape weeks in advance, the scarier the better. \u00a0When he was really young, he was happy to go trick-or-treating in whatever sweet little outfit I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15183,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,8,9,10],"tags":[204,324,387,446],"class_list":{"0":"post-168","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-letting-go","8":"category-parenting","9":"category-parenting-boys-parenting","10":"category-parenting-teens","11":"tag-halloween","12":"tag-parenting-2","13":"tag-sons","14":"tag-tradition","15":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/600x600.png?fit=600%2C600","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}