It was pretty bad.
Several times in the last few weeks, I started making a post about it. I wanted to share what was happening and warn you to be careful and keep yourself and your family safe, but I couldn’t. Not only was I mentally and emotionally crippled, but I didn’t want to start mass hysteria until I could gather my shit and info.
No, this post is not about that either for two reasons: 1) I’m still shaky about it and can’t trust to keep this levelheaded. 2) I still don’t have all the facts and I don’t want to give you the wrong information. But mostly, I felt I had gone long enough without posting anything and I had made myself a promise back when I returned in my post, WHERE IN THE WORLD IS AIRICKA PHOENIX? that I wouldn’t drop the ball again.
So . . . yeah.
But I am behind 😰 I missed several posts in October, and a couple in November. So I’m just . . . ugh. If anything, the situation (which is what I’m calling the incident mentioned above) infuriates me all the more, because I had a goal, a calendar, damn it! I HAD A PLAN!!! I was so set.
*Deep breaths, A. Deep breaths*
Okay, so I’m jumping back on track with the original plan. I’m going to share the two posts from October that I mentioned in WHAT DO YOU FEAR (see link above) and continue from there, minus this post, because this is just a information filler . . . *shifty eye*
HALLOWEEN!!!!
I missed Halloween with you. That makes me sad. It was a beautiful night, cool, but not frigid. It had been raining earlier that day, but it stopped around three, which was perfect. Buuuuuuutttt…..
FUNNY STORY!
So, I had a graveyard shift later that evening, which meant I had roughly two hours to hit the candy, get the kids home, grab my things and head out. In the scheme of things, compared to my eight hour trick or treat marathons as a kid . . . it was depressing. Anyway, so I gave the kids two options.
a) we can hit up Walmart, grab a couple boxes of chocolate, get home, make popcorn and watch something horrific and gory, like Hocus Pocus.
b) we foot the block and get as many doors as humanly possible, at a brisk, near sprinting run.
10yrold: Hmmm, B. I like B. We should do B!
Me, shrug: Okay.
We grabbed our jackets, pillow cases, shoes, and headed out.
*Pause story for a second*
So, 10yrold dressed up as a skeleton. 12yrold dressed as some random anima girl in jeans and a pink sweater. I have no idea who she was. I don’t even think she was part of anything, just some drawing someone had drawn. But she loved it and so we’d gone to the store and bought her jeans and a sweater. I was very pro this choice for the simple fact that . . . it was a costume that she could wear throughout the year.
*YAY happy wallet!*
10yrold’s costume was basically the same. Black tights, top, and sneakers. We painted her face and she was done. Psssh easy.
But that’s not the point of this.
So, we’re about eight houses in and we get to this woman’s place and she’s sitting on the porch with her bowl of candy and rocking chair. She complimented 10yrold on her skeleton face. Then she turns to 12yrold.
So, pause again.
12yrold has selective mutism and severe anxiety. She’s incredibly shy and sensitive, and gets upset very easily.
Return to story
The woman turns to 12yrold with her jeans and bulky jacket and asks what she was. Now, 12yrold talks to no one outside the family. Usually, one of us answers for her. In this case, it was 10yrold, but I guess “anime girl” was something the woman had never heard of, because she turns to 12yrold with a pack of Twizzlers in hand and says, “Next time you come to my house, you better be dressed up, or you’re not getting anything.”
Even from the driveway, I could see 12yrold’s shoulders going up to her ears. Her whole body shrunk in on itself and she pulled her bag back to her. I knew she was about to cry. I could FEEL her pain. I wanted to . . . well, I can’t put that in print, but any parent in my shoes (I think) has some sense of what I was feeling in that moment.
😠💢
Thankfully, 10yrold got a hold of the situation before I could.
She took the Twizzlers from the woman, put them back in the woman’s bowl, took 12yrold’s hand and said in all her 10yrold outrage, “She’s a homicidal maniac. They look like everyone else.” Then, she walked her sister off the porch.
I have never been so proud in my life.
Later that night, I asked her, “Wasn’t that a line from the Addam’s Family?”
10yrold, sheepish: “I panicked!”
I love her. lol.
Anyway, back to the original story.
So, we finished one entire street. Just one. From bottom to top. I start down the second street when 10yrold looks at me, wrinkles her nose and says, “You knooooow what? I think we did good tonight. You know what we should do? We should hit up Walmart, get a couple boxes of chocolate, come home, make some popcorn and watch a movie.” *Big, innocent smile*
Me: …..wait ………. why does that sound familiar?! OH HOLD ON! 😒
So, we went home and watched The Addams Family, the TV show. ^_^
The End.
How was your Halloween? Any stories you’d like to share? Drop them in the comments below. YES I WANT TO HEAR THEM!!!
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This is Airicka saying, until next time, thanks for hanging out and I will see you soon. 🖤
- What Do You Fear? — ✔️
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