Today is Friday — and not just any Friday, it is Halloween. This coincidence has created immense joy for many University students.
With no class tomorrow, students nationwide will have the ability to enjoy Halloween guilt free. There are no reservations about possibly feeling sick in class the following morning – a sickness derived from large amounts of candy consumption, of course.
Across Grounds, students will emerge in their favorite Halloween costumes. Overly clever people will find themselves explaining their costumes repeatedly. Other students will observe and enjoy the costumes worn by children at trick-or-treating on the Lawn, while they make their own plans for liquor-treating on the Corner later at night.
Halloween is best known for the costumes. In more traditional and ceremonial roles, costumes allow the wearer to pay homage, representing the image of a figure or an idea deemed worthy of respect. In other instances, wearing a costume allows one to appear and act as something he or she could never be otherwise. Back in elementary school when I strapped on my MLB costume — an Orioles shirt, a Yankees hat and grey pants — my imagination allowed me to see myself as a professional ball player.
The very nature of appearing as something you’re not, regardless of the purpose, is a strange tendency — but it’s one not relegated to donning costumes on Halloween.
I would not typically present myself to friends on the Corner in the same manner as I would to my Spanish professor less than 12 hours later — though certainly both are versions of myself.
This molding of our personality is so pervasive it has become a social norm. Just as showing up to pass out candy at Trick-or-Treating on the Lawn without a costume will subject you to derision from your peers, so too does failing to morph and mold your comportment as the people you’re around change.
If I addressed a professor or even a cashier at a Corner shop in the same way I speak with my friends, I would be considered rude. Contrastingly, if I approached my friends as I do my boss, I would find myself accused of acting stiff and “unlike myself.”
I’m not sure why this is. It has nothing to do with respect — I respect professors, friends and restaurant employees all very highly. But it’s part of an ingrained social norm, one that we are expected to conform to and relish in. And though the practice seems forced at times, or unnatural at first glance, it also feels necessary — desirable, even.
So while we use Halloween as an opportunity to wear costumes and appear as something we’re not, it will not be the only time, as students like me will continue to mold our characteristics — and hopefully, be better off for it.
Aidan’s column runs biweekly Fridays. He can be reached at a.cochrane@cavalierdaily.com.
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