"Out, Damned Spot" by Jairus P

One of the many worldly traditions that has seemingly transcended time and space is the same day in which everyone has the open opportunity to dress as they like. You walk around and notice the myriad of guises a person wears to conceal an identity, all to get away from the lifestyle they’ve built for themselves, one day each year. The competitively intelligent girl hands in her books for that little black dress and pig tail braids to mimic Morticia’s daughter. The overtly post-adolescent idealist gives up his garb to mock a religious custom on his self-aggrandizing carriage dragged by a horse of lies, all on a pilgrimage to hide his vile intentions. The two lovers fashion a gimmick in the costumes they’ve created, only spelling out cultural appropriation. Ah, yes, Halloween has given each of us an opportunity to give up a lifestyle in exchange for another, a mask that can hide us from all kinds of evil. But at what cost?

            It’s safe to say that all teenagers dread the prospect of high school, but what many of us don’t know that it’s the playing ground of all kinds of costumes. We walk around and pass each other during passing period, intentionally ignoring the masks of the people we accidentally bump into or shove when the traffic rate becomes slower than your average Millennial. No tricks and no treats. Don’t believe me? We all do it and don’t think that you haven’t made one yourself.

            I, myself, change my masks during all parts of the day. One particular time in which I have to put on a guise is when I take notice of a person I always want to confront and let out this anger, this belligerent part of myself that I try to suppress every chance I get. I know in my bones that I want to throw my hurt at their face, that I want to show them the scars left on my heart. Every chance I see them, I have the constant proclivity to think that they need to repent for what they did to my aching soul and the only way, it seems, is to show them my bare self and the constantly healing cuts left on my skin. But, we’ve been molded to believe that confrontation is a mere synonymous term for indecency.

What society underestimates about me, though, is that I’m not afraid of indecency – no, no, no.  I’m afraid of breaking down in a pithy attempt to let go of myself, of this angst. It’s not worth it…It’s never worth it. That’s what we’re all thinking when we see that person, right? The one person that gets under your skin, the one that’s bewitched your mind to believe that they’re worth your time, even after they’ve hurt your soul. It’s never worth it to lose yourself to show someone the jarring effects that was birthed from the seeds of anger and hurt created by that one person…One damn person. So, what do we do to not exercise our First Amendment right? What do we do to compromise our freedom to say what we feel and want?

Disguises and costumes and masks, oh my!

If you still don’t believe me, look back on your high school career and tally the number of times you’ve had to walk onto campus with a front. That word has the exact same meaning as that clean and overly used word, façade, if you didn’t know. Whatever term you put on a “covering for all or part of the face to conceal one’s identity,” you must know at this point that all roads, all terms lead back to a mask.

Let’s see, for all you nonbelievers – take a look at the pictures with all your friends. You’ve seen them use the mask in action. Every time you know they’re going through some kind of tribulation, they still come to school with the intent to show everyone, especially their dear best friend (you in this situation) that they’re “alright” or just “having a bad day.” We all have those friends, that’s how it always starts: with a mask. We don’t really know who these people are until we’ve given them the courage to take off that mask, to give them trust and validation. And at the moment, at that very moment, it is when a friendship is truly conceived: when we openly decide to share the burdens of what lies beneath the mask and the price it takes to put one on. What better binds a friendship together than loyalty and truth?

But, that in itself is essentially a paradox. Who do we trust with all these masks? If you let that front down, will the other person do the same? Don’t oversynthesize and just think: who can we trust and who can we tell? Our society has left us in a cesspool of deceit, to constantly tell ourselves that we need to put a mask on, to hide what we feel and what we say. You probably won’t even put the one you’re wearing down to accept the fact that what you’re reading is true. The tough jock can’t show any sign of himself that is considered, at the least bit, feminine without being called “faggot.” The girl can’t go around with short shorts or a tank top in the heat of day without being called “slut” or even a woman who shows some accentuated muscle can’t go out without being called a “dyke.” Our society, which is comprised of all of us, all of you, has pushed our own kind to wear a mask…Has pushed you to wear a mask. Halloween doesn’t just come once a year – it is a constant holiday that has settled in our bones. Every day you wake up, you open your closet to find a collection of those masks you collect each and every year. In truth, we’re slowly normalizing this custom to only ignore the fact that the pound of flesh we must pay for this is a debt that no one can repay: our own humanity.

Yes, there is always that bit of good that is shown to the world, the source that comes with the old age adage “There is good in every person, everyone.” But that’s the thing with beauty – it’s a curse on the world that keeps us from seeing who the real monsters are and which of the innocent cower in true fear, one that knows our nightmares and instills our own Halloween each and every day of the year.