This was one of my favorite Halloween costumes ever: The Trojan Horse. It took three days to build (wooden frame with spray-painted cardboard), and was big enough to fit at least five of my friends inside. It was so big, we needed at least one person on the outside to help us navigate throught the streets of Athens.
Athens was (and is) known nationally for its downtown Halloween street party. We were still high school kids, so we were forbidden by our parents from going into town that night. Of course, that didn’t stop us. With some secret planning, we snuck the Trojan Horse from behind my parents’ garage and walked it all the way to downtown Athens.
People chanted “Trojan Horse!” when they saw us. They cheered and waved, they raised beer cups in our honor. We made our way proudly throught the drunken crowds until the crowd’s energy swelled, and the people pushed up against the horse to touch it and bang on its sides. In a burst of violence, the crowd heaved into the horse, which collapsed around us. We escaped through a small cardboard door, and, amazingly, none of us were hurt.
A photo of our horse appeared on the front page of the paper the following day, and if any of our parents noticed the photo, they didn’t mention it to us.
Oh, yes they did. When Mom was shown a copy of the Post the next morning, she did indeed mention it to Jason! I'm pretty sure she was secretly proud of him (and the rest of you), though.
You guys got away with an incredible amount of stuff. I was furious about it – as the oldest child, I never got away with anything. I still maintain that Jason was always the favorite child, and you can tell him I said so.
I do hope you don't hold it against him or us. You'e right, it was noticed in the paper, but I think Jason was the only one who got noticed! And youre right…. we did get away with a lot. Definitely not all the time, but a lot of the time.
I was there. I remember coming to your house and then seeing you uptown. I can’t believe you guys walked that all the way from your house. Yes, the Trojan Horse was the hit of the night.