16 Things I'd Put in My Own Haunted House (That Have Been Scaring Me For Years)
For starters, a room full of thermostats with a dad on the other side.
My husband, Slasher, looks at me and I tell him, “I’ll be right here, go have fun in the haunted pirate ship.”
I’m standing on a New Jersey boardwalk with a Diet Coke in my hand and my phone in the other. I have, at this moment, everything I need. Plus, the boardwalk speakers are pumping out Billy Idol, so now I have a soundtrack as I wait. Slasher, with our daughter, is off to do his most favorite thing: spooky stuff.
My dude is obsessed with horror. David S. Pumpkins and Michael Myers live in his heart with ghost Spongebob giggling in the background. Just the other day he told me that Halloween, the movie, is the Sammy Hagar of Van Halen and Friday the 13th is David Lee Roth.
“Halloween is serious, Friday the 13th is more of a party. As I get older and want to relax more, I have a new appreciation for Friday the 13th.”
“Wow,” I say to him. “This is huge.”
And I mean it. For years, we’ve been battling over Dave and Sammy and which one brings the better Halen experience. To get this kind of admission—that Sammy has his place, but is kind of a bummer—I never thought I’d see this day.
This is 75% of our relationship, us talking nonsense to each other about things that do not really matter, but matter a lot to us: who is the better lead singer of Van Halen, what’s the better horror franchise; the new McDonald Halloween pails are bullshit without real lids (me); the pails are awesome, who cares about the lids (Slasher).
Dude loves Halloween so much that he went and found me, a Libra, with a birthday in the best month, according to him, of the year. October is serious business in my house, a time when the training bras come off and the big, grownup tits pop out.
Slasher likes scary, mutilated Halloween and I like cute Halloween—frickin’ bats, Oingo Boingo, snow globes with jack-o-lanterns. Slasher is like: here’s this mutilated mask with a drooping eyeball and brains cascading down its left ear on the dining room table, “GOOD MORNING, WANT SOME EGGS??”
Every October Slasher makes a mental bucket list—a McBoo pail bucket, if I may—of spooky things he wants to do. And the first three things on that list, give or take, are haunted houses. But here’s the thing, that’s almost always a hard no from me.
My thinking goes something like this: why would I pay to get scared when plenty of terrifying things are happening out there, everywhere, for free. The kids are throwing mashed potatoes on Monet paintings and screaming they won’t have food by 2050. So, yes, I see your day-glo clown with teeth like claws, but I can’t stop thinking about those kids. FOR FREE. No admission necessary.
Which then got me thinking: What would I put in a haunted house?
A bedroom without a fan
I would confess to crimes against humanity, just stand up and announce myself as a purveyor of atrocities, rather than sleep in a room without whirling air.
A room full of thermostats with a dad on the other side
The speeds I’ve reached in order to turn down the thermostat before my father saw I’d changed it. I am talking Jackie Joyner-Kersee speeds. I’m talking Michael Phelps in a pool of anxiety sweat speed. I am talking like MY LIFE DEPENDS ON REACHING THAT THERMY BEFORE HE GETS TO THE FRONT DOOR, speed.
A loudspeaker saying, “pick a partner”
This is where villain origin stories are made.
Other people’s diets
I know you’re hungry but I’m not, so that sounds like a you problem and not a me problem. Someone send a fire truck, an ambulance, anything with flashing lights, save meeeeee.
Drive-thru screens at night
MY GOD I CAN HEAR MY EYEBALLS SIZZLING. Make it stop or so help me I will be forced to get out of this car and actually move my body for what I want.
Me, an old-head, trying to explain sarcasm to anyone in Gen Z
I love you all and I support you even more (I gave birth to one of you) but, my beloveds, please plant a sarcasm garden and watch it grow and blossom into where irony meets comedy. It will take the edge off.
Anyone who rings my doorbell
The universal sign of a serial killer.
“We just ate”
Like six hours ago. Honestly, there should just be a haunted house called “bodies, bodies, bodies” and every room is some bullshit someone has said to you about food or your size. Terrifying.
Wearing sequins
I love the look of sequins, but three minutes into wearing sequins and I want to die. They are heavy and they are hot and the material underneath is always scratchy. If I ever wear any again, I will be the woman memed to an inch of her life running around naked screaming, “they had to go.”
“We have Sprite”
Did I ask you if I wanted to blow my head back with carbonation? No, well then, why are you making that suggestion for me???
A room full of Anthony Bourdain fans
It’s a tell.
Teaching my child how to drive
I would rather have infant twins tandem breastfeeding from my bosom with a potty-training toddler at my feet then sit in a car with a teen thinking we’re both going to make it out of this alive.
A room of my own
It’s just a room with a laptop, a blinking cursor, and my thoughts. I’d never survive.
A hologram of the kid who noticed I didn’t have a thigh gap in 7th grade
And asked me “why do you walk like that?” when I was pulling the bunched up wad of denim from my crotch. “Well, Eric, because I am short, my thighs touch, and WHO ASKED YOU?!” I hope Eric from 7th grade only gets the jacked shopping cart every time he hits Home Depot.
Steps, all varieties
Staircases are my mortal enemy. Not because I can’t get up them—it will not be pretty, but I can do it and everyone will hear me, a dragon, breathing through it. But I have fallen down several staircases and survived. Granted it’s always the last four or 5 steps, so maybe this haunted house is filled with more of a doggy steps to the bed situation then a fully blown Michael Peterson staircase documentary. But it’s a fine line, really.
Everything about it makes me want to not survive.
Currently
🍋 Reading: Bad Vibes Only
The latest book from the host of the podcast Thanks, Terrible For Asking. My kid and I went to a signing and “met” Nora and her fabulous coat, and she’s great. Read this if you’re the “saddest happy” or “happy saddest” person you know.
🙏 Listening: Help Existing podcast
Rachel Krantz, one of the founding editors of Bustle, speaks to a different guest each week about a topic that might help listeners exist out in the world. I focused on the “Help Understanding the Publishing Industry with Jane Friedman” episode.
🧡 Wearing: This robe cardigan in pumpkin looks deliciously comfortable
For my thick babes
🥴 Saving: This Twitter thread about dating with the apps
I couldn’t even breathe I was laughing so hard. Bless the folks who are fully themselves in the sheets, I’ll be over here as prude as the day is long. Butt plug Jesus is now in my haunted house.
❓Asking: Who makes your favorite leggings?
My favorite pair were discontinued—they had the perfect blend of spandex and cotton—and now I can’t find anything like them. Torrid is meh, and I don’t care about side pockets or wicking. I want stretch that won’t blow seams. Leave a comment or hit reply.
Happy Halloween, everyone 🎃 👻 🧙♀️
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