There’s this Canadian sketch show called This Hour Has 22 Minutes that I used to obsessively watch when I was 18 and patriotically watching the CBC. The sketches can be hit and miss, especially now that the show’s been running for well over two decades and its humour hasn’t exactly managed to chokehold millennials in the same way that political memes now do.
But there’s one sketch that I always remember and it’s this one:
Sorry if it’s region-blocked. Maybe you’ve got a VPN and can set yourself to Canada. In a nutshell, it’s about a theme park called “November Village” where everything is cold and damp and closed because of rain. I just find it funny because November isn’t all that exciting. Sure, we’ve got Remembrance Day, or Veteran’s Day in the US, and it’s good to honour the veterans but also that’s like, kind of a bummer, right?
It would be disrespectful to unbox Mariah before we finish honouring the veterans. All those shoppers who refuse to spend a minute in silence while shopping at Walmart at 11:11 AM on November 11th really care about being respectful.
I appreciate the buffer, at least. I just want November to be November. Sombre. Quiet. Relaxing. A calm before the storm of glittery fake snow.
Everyone in the writer circles is talking about the “Halloween Hangover” and I love that term. It drags out the Halloween season a bit longer and gives us time to reflect. I’ve always found it a bit frustrating that Halloween happens, and we all just move on because the new Starbucks holiday cups are out.
On November 1st, I tore down all the Halloween decorations in my yard. It felt good at the moment because I had Korn blasting in my ears for the 4+ hours it took me to rip down the creepy cloth, dismantle my handmade ghouls, and sort all the leaf-covered materials into their plastic boxes.
I was stubborn, though. I didn’t ask my husband to help me when I should have. I took a bit too much on, much like I do every October, trying too hard to have the best-decorated house in the complex, while also making my kid’s costumes, while also working my retail job, while also staying up until 1 AM most nights to write.
And so, after my 245th spell of cleaning rage, my husband confronted me and said that I was acting like a fucking crazy person. He was right, and I appreciated the reality check, as my thoughts tend to spiral and my husband is usually the only person who can yank me back out before the yellow wallpaper really starts messing with my head.
But I still didn’t take a break because I had already internalized the need to put all the Halloween shit away. And then I put the laundry away. And then I started cleaning the house. And then it was dinner time.
I just want November to be November. Sombre. Quiet. Relaxing. A calm before the storm of glittery fake snow.
One thing I did really enjoy about October was the 1.5 days I spent reading Britney Spears’s book, The Woman in Me. In it, Britney reflects upon her forced confinement in the mental health facility:
The hardest part was that I believed that, in front of the doctors or visitors, I had to pretend the whole time I was okay. If I became flustered, it was taken as evidence that I wasn’t improving. If I got upset and asserted myself, I was out of control and crazy.
It reminded me of what I’d always heard about the way they’d test to see if someone was a witch in the olden days. They’d throw the woman into a pond. If she floated, she was a witch and would be killed. If she sank, she was innocent, and oh well. She was dead either way, but I guess they figured it was still good to know what kind of woman she’d been.
I’d say this book was Halloween-appropriate. It’s a V.C. Andrews book IRL. Gothic tropes dance all over Britney’s narrative, and now we know who all the monsters are in Britney’s life. I’ve never liked Justin Timberlake.
Despite the stress, it felt good to connect with someone again. I loved Britney when she first came out. I listened to her early albums obsessively, especially her self-titled album, Britney. Sadly, I succumbed to a lot of the media’s portrayal of her at that time.
I’m happy to be listening to Blackout as I write this.
I’m happy to go into November with an attitude of self-reflection.
November is also NaNoWriMo. It’s literally the month for writers, and my goal is to finish the first draft of my Woodstock 99 novella. It’s a realistic goal, I think. I ironed out most of the plot points, which will slot me some time to watch The Crown when it returns for its final season on the 16th.
If you know me, you know I love all that Royal Family drama. November is the perfect time for it because it’s cold enough to dig out all the wool plaid stairs and the old money layers that make for a good outfit for cold dreary weather.
I’ll be seeing you in November Village.
The part with your husband doing the reality check made me laugh, because that's also mine.