Fairy tales happen ‘once upon a time’ and always non-human characters such as trolls, gnomes, elves, fairies, talking wildlife, dragons, unicorns and others. As children they are easy to understand, and there are generally lessons behind them. But the tales that we hear as children nowadays are softened versions of the ones told to children a hundred years ago. Original fairy tales were not only means to help children learn a lesson, but to put an idea in their head that if they didn’t do as they were told, or wandered off somewhere, something terrible could happen to them. To be fair, the further back one looks in time, the more dangers there were for children and adults alike. But if we told these stories to our children, they might wind up in tears or with some strange phobia that would follow them into adulthood.

Fairy Tale Lessons

A book was given to my sister and I when we were a little older. It was a book that had belonged to my grandfather, so our mother had kept it for us until we were old enough to enjoy it without damaging it’s old pages. I believe the copy write on the inside cover was somewhere around 1903, but I don‘t remember what it was called. I‘m sure my sister still has it though.

In this book, was the story of a little boy. He loved sweets you see, and every chance he got he would sneak some behind his mother’s back. He kept finding ways to eat more and more sweets, and gradually his skin began to change. It became a different texture, and less firm around his face and chest. He didn’t stop though, because he simply loved sweets too much to stop. Eventually, he became like molasses and began to melt in the heat of the noon sun. He cried out for help, but his mother was not around (he had snuck out for what else but sweets) and no other seemed to notice enough to come to his aid. So when he could no longer move, the stray dogs of the area came and gobbled him up.

May we reconvene under the blood red moon,
-Black Widow

Disney feature films began popping up around the late 1930s, so there’s a very good chance that if you’re alive today Walt Disney had something to do with your childhood. Or at the very least has been a part of your children or grandkids lives. Almost everyone has a favorite Disney movie or character that meant a lot to them when they were younger, or inspired them somehow. So for Halloween this year, why not pay homage to the characters that made your younger years more bearable?

Disney

For the girls (regardless of age) there are Disney princess costumes available for almost every single one of them. You really don’t need to worry about wigs either, because there is at least one girl that for each hair color. If you’re a red-head you could be Ariel, if you’re a brunette there is Belle, if you’ve got darker hair you could choose from Jasmine or Snow White, and if you’re blond there are the options of Cinderella or Aurora (sleeping beauty).

But Disney isn’t all about it’s princesses either, there are plenty of other characters to pick and choose from. You could go traditional and put together a costume that resembles Mickey, Minnie, Donald or Goofy. Or you could pick from some of the other characters such as Peter Pan, Pinocchio, any of the princes, Hercules, Jafar, Captain Hook, Cruella de Vil, or one of the monsters from Monsters Inc.

Keep in mind that some of these other characters, though they aren’t necessarily less well know, are definitely less favored in contrast to (for example) the princesses. So if you want to be them and you want to do a decent job, it’s going to take a little bit of creativity and work. Especially for the characters are aren’t really human, such as the monsters, or Mickey. But if you can pull it off, everyone will be very impressed by your creativity and skill, you might even win a costume contest or two!

As a child you believe that possibilities are endless. You decide you want to be a firefighter, a knight, a doctor, a mommy, a veterinarian, a princess, or an artist, and there is nothing that will stop you. There are endless possibilities for good, but also endless possibilities for bad. There might really be a monster under your bed or in your closet, despite how many times your parents have told you it was impossible. Mommy also said you wouldn’t be late to school, but all the police blocked up the road and you were late anyway. Not everything she says is always right.

old toys

Imagine if children were in control and the adults were just bystanders, unable to change how everything was being run. Rod Serling did, in a few of his Twilight Zone episodes.

One featured a man and a woman. They awoke in a small town, wondering how they had gotten there. They had been at a party the night before, but did not remember driving to their current location. They walked around the town to find that none of the cars would start, that the trees were fake, and some of the building faces were cardboard and Styrofoam. They decided that perhaps while intoxicated the night before they had stumbled across a movie set and spent the night there unknowingly. Regardless, they couldn’t seem to find a way out of this town and there was not a soul in sight to ask questions of. Eventually they found and train and boarded, thinking that they would finally be able to escape this increasingly unsettling place. But the train simply made a loop and took them back to the same station in a matter of minutes. At the end it was revealed though these two people had independent thought and free will, they were ultimately nothing more than a little girl’s plaything. They town and homes they had explored were simply a dollhouse and town setting, and they would be trapped in this place for the rest of their lives.

May we reconvene under the blood red moon,
-Black Widow