Halloween in the most stressful holiday to fully embrace. For me, anyway. Thanksgiving: you just have to cook some food. Christmas: buy some stuff, make up excuses for not buying anything, cook some food. Valentine's Day: I've never had a good Valentine's Day, but I'm not sure if I've been involved enough on V-Day to worry much about it. Halloween, however, you have to figure out a GOOD costume. Because the holiday doesn't mean much in itself, and if you're gonna be part of Halloween, you have to dress up.

I've never been able to figure out a good costume, and I'm not really good at "being someone else." Which, to many people, seems like a vacation from themselves. But I'm not really a good actor. I only have one character floating around in my head. Me. Even when I try to imitate someone else, it comes off as me emphasizing a phrase in a strange way. So being someone else--I don't have a concept of that. It's not a vacation, it's work.

Makeup is always a problem. I've done many Halloweens with makeup on my face, and it's never helped. For one, I'm not good at putting makeup on. I always put way too much on, and it becomes a swirling mess.

I dressed up as Elliot from E.T. in sixth grade, which worked pretty well because everyone knew who I was supposed to be. But mostly it was because my little brother had a bofo E.T. costume. The kid in the sweatshirt hunchback costume--well, it was a good costume by association only.

I tried to be one of the warrior people in "The Warrior" by Scandal in junior high. No one got it, and I had so much makeup on, no one knew who I really was either. So I just wandered around the dance with red and blue jags on my face, getting puzzled faces from people as I passed.

I dressed up like a glam rocker (black stretch velvet pants, gold shirt, long moussed hair and my usual "what the fuck" make-up job) once in the mid-90s, and it was ok. But I still had to explain my concept. I think this is what bothers me the most. If I have to tell you what or who I am, it's not that great a costume. The pants were pretty nice, though--even if they were girls pants, and I couldn't get my ass in them now with a crowbar.

I have a minimalist Halloween costume I originally made up for a magazine cover concept we never used. It's a white t-shirt that says "I am the head vampire" across the chest. I actually wear this rather frequently when I'm out shopping on the weekends (i.e. leisure wear), but no one ever says anything about it. No one asks why a vampire (much less the Head Vampire) can walk around in the middle of the day or why I have such a good tan. So, just from the lack of comment, I'm thinking this is too minimalist for an actual Halloween costume.

The best costume I've done in the last ten years was "Dead Man With Bullet Holes." I wore an old black suit, painted my face white (and then washed most of the white off so I was eerily pale), painted bullet holes on my forehead, put more bullet holes in the white shirt and that was that. Even the door guy at the party knew what I was trying for. It wasn't as good as the two girls who dressed up like matching breasts with mixed drinks you could drink from the nipples (later they would both get on a trampoline and the breasts bounced independently--it was a moment), but I wasn't bad.

I've skipped Halloween a few times in the last five years. It's just too much for me. I like myself and don't really have a need to be someone else. I know, it's a lame excuse. But the whole point of Halloween is to get those pesky demons out in one night--like a psychic purging. For the most part, I don't feel I necessarily need that.

But I have to dress up this year. I have no choice. My band is playing its first gig ever at a Halloween party. If you're part of the party, you have to dress up--and dress up good. And Halloween is on a Friday. There are so many reasons to get with the program this year. So I'm jumping on the costume horse yet again.

I have five days to get my freak on. Hopefully no one will ask, "So, what are you supposed to be?"

Matt Worley is just another freak in the freak.