the real scare

I guess I should write about Halloween, since I won't have another chance to. Here's the thing: I absolutely love Halloween, every bit of it. I love the haunted houses, the spooky movies, the pumpkin carving, and the apple cider. I love decorating for Halloween, and picking a costume, and I did love trick-or-treating before I started getting snarky remarks for being too old. But I feel like I have had to put that love on pause this year, because I'm busy all the time. It's gotten to a point where my mother made the comment: "You're so busy you don't even have time to think."

When I say "think" I actually mean "daydream." You see, every now and then the thought that Halloween is coming up does cross my mind, but that's about it before my brain has to move on to more pressing topics. College apps are the obvious monster in this story, and as I like to joke about sometimes: Halloween is nothing compared to the Day of the Dead, Nov. 1.

My head feels like it's empty all the time. I have been trying to write this blog post for much longer than I usually spend on blog posts, and I have run out of things to say. For blog posts I usually do the opposite from my other writing-related assignments. Instead of becoming a "content machine," producing sentences upon sentences of well-written and coherent ideas, I turn my brain off. For blog posts, I mute all my thoughts and allow my stream of consciousness to take its course, and I just type out a neat version of that. Right now, my stream of consciousness is a list of what I need to finish interspersed with yelling. I don't want to write that, and I don't think anyone would enjoy reading it.

So for this week, I just want to say to anyone reading this, Happy Halloween. From the bottom of my heart, I hope you all get to watch some spooky movies and eat lots of candy. Enjoy the festivities of this random holiday in the middle of the semester, because in another month we get Thanksgiving and then Christmas, and they're not as good as Halloween.

Didney!

(Yes, I know the title is misspelled. One time I accidentally wrote Didney instead and I thought it was so funny that I just call it Didney now...)

I've been listening to Disney songs a lot recently. A while ago on my birthday I felt like singing along to Disney, so I made a playlist for myself, and it just kind of existed for two weeks since then. A few days ago I saw the playlist, and out of lack of anything else to listen to, I put it on.

Now, some may know that the month of October is a stressful one for seniors, for unknown reasons, and at least I feel like at any point I might shatter like a porcelain doll. But that's just me... However, whenever I'm listening to Disney songs I get surprisingly calm. I'm not saying that my problems suddenly disappear and I become a kid again, I wish. What I mean is that the fantasy that Disney seems to put behind every note has a curing vibe. It's like the song is telling me that if I just breathe through it I'll be fine.

There are also so many themes in any one song, they're not all just "happy, happy, happy." For example, one of my favorites is Hercules' Won't Say I'm in Love. In it, Meg keeps saying she won't fall for Hercules because she's been heartbroken before, which sounds like it would be a relatively somber song. Except, there's the muses in the background saying that they know she is already hooked, and they're so sassy and fun that it counteracts Meg's words. Furthermore, she finishes the song by saying, "At least out loud, I won't say I'm in love," which gives a nice positive finishing touch to the whole thing. So many Disney songs do things like this, where they incorporate many different emotions into one song, but they still turn out positive.

If we want to do the Uni student thing and overanalyze the situation, this could all turn out to be a metaphor to how our senior year is going: overall pain and heartbreak, with some sarcastic humor, but it all turns out fine at the end.

But you know what? I don't wanna do that. I'm not going to look at everything with the idea that there has to be something bigger. I'm just saying, Disney is a pure form of entertainment that can hug you through song, and makes me feel slightly better about myself. So I recommend, if you were once an avid Disney fan, find your favorite songs and give it a try.

For anyone who's curious, here's my playlist:
Won't Say I'm in Love (Hercules), Almost There (Princess and the Frog), I'll Make a Man Out of You (Mulan), Dig a Little Deeper (Princess and the Frog), A Girl Worth Fighting for (Mulan), Friends on the Other Side (Princess and the Frog), The Gospel Truth (Hercules), Never Had a Friend like Me (Alladin), It's Tough to be a God (The Road to El Dorado), Be Our Guest (Beauty and the Beast), I've Got a Dream (Tangled), Under the Sea (Little Mermaid), Mother Knows Best (Tangled), Hakuna Matata (Lion King), Zero to Hero (Hercules), How Far I'll Go (Moana), Shiny (Moana), Hawaiian Roller Coaster (Lilo & Stitch), Poor Unfortunate Souls (Little Mermaid), I See the Light (Tangled).