I remember going to Mrs. Maulick’s house, as a child, on Halloween. She lived just up the street from us and my friends and I would be falsely accused, by her, of coming back a second time so no candy for us. 

As an adult, I still love Halloween. I once went to a Halloween party at the Elk’s Club in Paramus and a man showed up, in costume, by himself, and silently sat down. He didn’t so much as utter one word. No one knew who he was, and it was very effective and a bit scary.

That gave me the idea of doing the same thing at my weekly card club that fell on Halloween that  year. It was when I was living in Garden Apartments in River Edge. It was Chantel’s turn to be the host. I dressed up in a man’s old baggy suit and a rubber mask depicting a Chinaman, that covered my face and head. Since I was Chinese, I decided to just walk into the kitchen and start cooking rice. I didn’t even knock. My friends were in the living room, talking and suddenly there was complete silence so I knew I had their attention. When I joined them in the living room, Dot decided that it might be me, and she proceeded to pull my disguise off and we all had a good laugh.  

Then the man of the house showed up but he knew he was banished from joining us — no men allowed in our club, so he retired to the bedroom. Someone said it was too bad he hadn’t seen me in full costume so we decided that I would go out in the hall and knock on the living room door and then someone would yell to Anre’ to answer the door. I forgot to mention that I had a toy gun that looked very real.  When my over 6 foot tall friend opened the door, he looked at me with complete fear on his face and quickly shut the door.  I realized later what a chance I took because we were on the second floor and he could have thrown me over the rail to the entry below.  In other words - “Don’t try this at home.”

But we weren’t done yet. We decided to go to Frank’s house.  He lived in a first floor apartment and his wife, Ruth wanted to surprise him. Again I just walked into their kitchen. The rest of the gang just waited in the hallway. I made sure to leave the kitchen door open so they could hear his reaction. When I started walking into the living room, Frank stopped me saying, “Get back in here.” His kids were sleeping in a bedroom off the living room so he was protecting them. Again I was taking chances. Grown ups aren’t always truly grown up, at least not this one.  

There were costume parties my husband Jim and I went to. At one he went as a wrestler and I as a boxer. The host was dressed as a baby, with socks, a cute little hat, and a diaper with a brown stain on the back. Jim wore a robe and sneakers and I put a stocking over my head so that my face was distorted from too many punches.  

One year we went as bums. I was Apple Annie and he wore a corrugated barrel with suspenders attached. Another year we were ghosts. All we needed was a couple of white sheets.  

I haven’t gone to any costume parties lately but if I do, you readers will be the first to know.