Halloween is among the most intriguing celebrations we have each year, and it is really the only holiday that paradoxically gives anyone the ability to be anonymous while truly being able to show their inherent nature. Young Goodman Brown might have lost “Faith” when he realized the depravity of the human condition, but let’s just ignore any startling juxtaposition between his experience and the current trend our society seems to share, and point out what really is most important.

Which obviously would be community service. No, just kidding, I meant costumes.

The allure of guising oneself is fascinating. We have been trying to hide ourselves behind masks for thousands of years, yet this inexplicable fixation on the occult or macabre continues to this day.

I guess I understand why anyone would want to hide who they are from other people.  The idea of being exposed for everyone to see is frightening and creates a feeling of vulnerability. Though, at least everyone here at Penn State is mature enough to not care what others think of us. No one dresses up at all during any given weekend while wearing absurd makeup, ridiculous outfits, crazy hair, obscure footwear, or any other misleading attribute that might give the illusion of a different persona.

Nope. That never happens here.

Anyway, if you are freaking out last minute about what you can wear as a Halloween costume, I am here to give you some advice to help narrow down your choices. In case you haven’t already noticed, or if you stopped reading to immediately comment on the photo, I dressed up like Lady Gaga. It was a dream come true for me, I finally experienced the Walk of Shame. I am not wearing it for Halloween, though. Sorry.

How to Make a Good Costume:  Girls

The first step a girl must take in order to know that she will have a successful costume, is to make sure that she is surrounded by other girls wearing the same costume.

So, first things first: find out what your friends are going out as, and by God, make sure you have the same thing.

Generally, what you can expect to wear on Halloween is going to be completely original.  So don’t worry, no one will be wearing the same thing as you. Uh. Except your friends.  Anyway, the best way to have a great costume is full commitment. You just have to follow through and make it happen. For example:

Your friends suggest being nurses for Halloween. That’s a completely respectable costume idea, I mean, I’d give just about anything to walk around dressed like a health-care provider. But why not just go one step further? Why not “slutty nurses”? Think of the lines you can say to people:

“I can help make that swelling go down.”

“You seem to have a cold, let’s warm you up.”

Or my personal favorite: “You won’t feel a thing!”

Wouldn’t it just be that much more funny, if you and all your friends could go out and actually pretend to be slutty? I promise, everyone will think it’s just as hilarious. It’s so clever! And, the best part is, all those other actual promiscuous women wandering around on Halloween are probably going to dress up as slutty cats. I’m sure they will have a really dumb name too like “We’re the pussy cats!”.

But, when you finally have your costume in front of you, make sure you keep this maxim in mind: less is more. You’ll go places if you follow that.

How to Make a Good Costume:  Guys

Let’s get this out of the way now: don’t dress up like Lady Gaga. It doesn’t get you anywhere. Except it seems to be pretty popular at Chumley’s. Really, instead though, what every guy should try to do for their costume is pretend that they are on that cooking show Five Ingredients or Less, because that’s really all your costume should have. A solid fallback costume is always your roommate’s mask of JoePa. You don’t even have to change out of your RalphLauren polo!  Anyway, the best strategy for a guy to make a costume is really figuring out how to make everything around you into something you can wear. For example:

8 empty boxes of Natty Light will easily make you a Natty Suit of Armor. You can also get away with Chippendales dancer. Cut off the collar on your shirt, make a bowtie from your pillow case and you and your bro can just make it seem like you’re dancing with girls out of ironic humor, while you already have your shirt off. It’s win-win! Another completely feasible hand-made costume: grab your bathrobe, your guitar, a sombrero, and your Sperrys and you can just go out like that. If anyone asks, “What are you for Halloween?” you can spitefully respond “Uh. Dave Matthews.”

If worse comes to worst, you can actually not even dress up. No one cares what guys wear.  You could have on only underwear and pass that off as a costume. Or, you could walk around in normal clothes and say casually “I’m a working class citizen. I also voted.”  Whatever, no one cares.

Recap:  Full commitment. Wear it proudly. Make it happen.

Later in the week, Onward State will be having a costume contest for users who submit us their photo. Real simple: best costumes win. If you think you can top my Lady Gaga ensemble, put your prowess to the gauntlet.