There is nothing funny about Halloween. This sarcastic festival reflects, rather, an infernal demand for revenge by children on the adult world.
-- Jean Baudrillard
TrolloweenFriday, October 31, 1997 This morning I buckled down and sewed four Trollsylvanian vests, which I had cut out Thursday evening. I had four available already, but I was worried that there wouldn't be enough for everyone, since I wasn't sure who all would be joining us. I really like the interplay of all the striped fabrics. Very festive!
In the afternoon I went downtown to get my license plate tabs renewed. My first stop was the Seattle Municipal Building, to get a parking sticker for my neighborhood. This could have been done by mail at any time, but since I had evidently not got around to mailing the form, it seemed better to go directly to the office. The parking tickets mentioned below were due to lack of this sticker. Parking in my neighborhood is tight enough that residential parking permits are required if you want to leave your car parked all day. Now that I have this sticker, which doesn't expire till April, 1999, I can take the bus to work and not worry. I knew I had a parking ticket that needed to be paid. They have set up a special window at the courthouse downtown, just to pay tickets that have gone to collection agencies, which is an improvement over the previous situation. Last year I had to go to another building, the office of the collection agency. I was hugely amused by the trick-or-treat bags they had available on all the counters at the courthouse. They were metallic plastic (good for visibility) with a Halloween design of little ghosts and witches. The spooky characters had little word balloons, with good advice like "Don't go it alone!" At the bottom of the bag, in large print: "Happy Halloween, from the Seattle Municipal Court!" So after getting my letter of adjudication from the court, I went up one block and over one block, to the King County building to get my license tabs renewed. Unfortunately, I had thought this was a year when I didn't need to get my car emissions tested. I was wrong. That last step meant that I wouldn't be accomplishing the renewal task today. I felt very clever when I realized that I could take one of the buses in the bus tunnel to get to the other end of downtown. I stopped off at the Westlake center and had some very good food-court Thai food.
Miss Gwen, a new Cacophonista, had offered as her first Cacophoony action to host us at her apartment before going to Trolloween, since she lives just a block from the Aurora Bridge. We refreshed ourselves with mulled cider and yummy cookies, and people put their Trollsylvanian clothes on. Even Troy, who had arrived with a conehead, decided to put on a vest, and put a trollsylvanian hat on top of his conehead. We walked down to the bridge. There was a large crowd gathered alread, probably about two hundred people. The drums were drum-drum-drumming. We observed all the other costumes, There were the stilt walkers, the big-headed aliens, the misguided man who put a real pumpkin over his head. (This seems like a good idea at first, but it's too heavy and damp to be a good mask.) There was a live band for the skeleton dancers. This was a group developed by a movement artist from Vashon Island. Anyone who wanted to signed up at the beginning of October, committing to practice and to create their own costume by painting the leotards. It was the second year for them, and they were great! The skeleton queen wore a hoop skirt (just the hoops, no skirt) as part of her costume. Finally it was time to set off down the hill, in that unique space formed by the high bridge above us, the tall pillars on either side. We turned into the alley and walked through some very dark spaces. We were startled by a huge spider hanging from a tree. It had already gotten one human victim who was still kicking his legs, so we were spared. There were people on the sidewalk observing us as we were crossing Fremont Avenue. I said to them, "Come on! Join us! This isn't a show you watch, it's something you participate in!" But they wouldn't join. In the parking lot where they show the Fremont Outdoor Cinema in the summertime, they had set up a mini-rave, with very cool images and flashing lights projected on a wall and on a temporary screen at right angles to the wall. We danced for a while, then moved on to where they were doing appliance bashing. Some smaller appliances were hung from wires like piñatas. I was concerned by the lack of eye protection on the part of the bashers, but luckily no one was injured. Then they had two teams, each racing to destroy a dryer. The dryer would be deemed destroyed if it was whacked such that no piece was sticking up more than one foot. Very exciting to see the competition, and the team closer to our side of the circle won! We walked along the street next to the canal (closed for the event) and found the fire puppet! The fire sculptures that are part of Trolloween are built with metal frameworks, and cables soaked with some petrochemical all over the framework. The fire puppet was one of those large rod puppets, about twenty feet tall, and very impressive in the dark when lit. There was also a face puppet, which took five people to operate. This was one of the projects that Wally was working on. Wally looked very butch, dressed in coveralls, a hard hat, gloves, and goggles. He was involved in several of the fire sculptures and performance pieces, and did a great job! The face puppet had two "eyes," each on a pole. Each eye had a catherine wheel which twirled and shot off sparks in a very exciting way. There was also a nose, and a mouth that was totally flexible, made entirely of the burning cable. They rigged up a system with sawdust and a leaf blower that sent huge gouts of flame through the mouth. (This was used on several other fire sculptures later.) Along the way there were dancers in a ring of fire, people swinging balls of fire on the end of ropes, a man in a complete protective suit whipping himself with a flaming cable, and a man "painting" with fire on a large black board. When I saw the balls of fire, I said to myself, "Flaming Globes of Sigmund!" (Seinfeld reference) The last sculpture is a new constellation for Fremont: instead of Orion, we now have Elvis. The sculpture had sparklers for the stars, and a flaming figure of Elvis singing into a microphone. The only thing that refused to burn was the actual name of "Elvis," written in script at the top of the sculpture. Then they brought out the wire-mesh scapegoat, which people had stuffed with slips of paper with their regrets and sins written out. He was impaled on a huge spike and burned, along with the rest of the sawdust. Very impressive flames!
I was pleased with how this evening went! We made a good effect being dressed as a group, without too much work. But I missed working with Luke on a project for the procession. In previous years I have assisted with whatever art project he was working on, but this year he didn't do one. Maybe we'll do something for the solstice feast.
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