Were you one of the estimated 1.597 million people in Salem who decided to go to Value Village last Saturday at 2:00 p.m. to see what the second-hand retailer had in stock for Halloween? I was. It was a mistake I won’t make again.
We were actually looking for some furniture, but got distracted by all of the 1960s loungewear and gold facepaint and all of the people walking around dressed like [insert favorite cartoon character here].
My ability to walk straight down an aisle of clothing is inversely proportional to the number of people in said aisle, so it wasn’t long before we threw up our hands in exasperation and screamed “Screw it!” let’s just find something at home.
And that’s how Adam ended up a Devil’s Advocate — easy, all you need is some horns and lawyer’s garb — and I made good on my promise to be a Zombie Emily Dickinson.
You know, a dead poet. They have societies for these things.
Sadly, no one at the Halloween party we attended recognized Ms. Dickinson, perhaps because she so staunchly refused to be a part of the public eye. Seriously, what did her diary read like?
Woke up this morning. Wore white. Wrote some poems.
The party guests did reconize me as that pus-spewing little girl from The Exorcist, though, so I walked around yelling obscenities and trying to make my head spin.
Zombies.
I’m still thinking about them.
I had a plan to write November’s Desperately Seeking Salem column about something kind of altruistic and Thanksgiving-y that I’ve been doing here in Salem, but I couldn’t help myself. Zombies are an image that fits well with what I see as the hunger for cultural products in Salem.
And I’ve been pretty excited to see what Salem’s Culture Shock Community Project has cooked up with zombies over the past month. Those guys deserve some recognition.
Their brains taste good.
Perhaps no one recognized you as Emily Dickinson because Jane Austen is more closely linked to zombies (and sea monsters?) in the public mind these days, thanks the reworking of Pride and Prejudice with added zombie mayhem?
Nah, that book is big among readers, but I’m gonna say that zombie Elizabeth Bennett has not yet eclipsed Linda Blair spewing yellow in the public imagination…
How would Zombie Dickinson disorder these?!
I heard a Fly buzz – when I died –
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air –
Between the Heaves of Storm –
or
Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me –
The Carriage held but just Ourselves –
And Immortality.
(etc)
Maybe Poetry & Popular Culture knows?
I think that is a challenge posed to the Talented Mr. Chasar….
I made the mistake of going as a book character as well. I took the idea of a cowboy costume from Diary of a Wimpy Kid, nobody got it. Just a lot of weird looks. Double baseball hats.
Dude, Emily Dickinson was a real person! But still… I’ve heard those Wimpy Kid books are real winners with all the kiddo readers. You should have just tipped your hat, smacked your chaps and said you were a sexy Cowboy.
Zombie Dickinson would have a lovely needlepoint sampler that said, “Parting is all we know of heaven and all we need of hell.”
I think if I went out as a real cowboy people would have just thought I was one of the Village People.