I don’t like Halloween. Not one ounce of it. Maybe I don’t like it because the skeevy feeling I always used to get when the last Milky Way in my pillow case was already partially opened never really left me. Or maybe it’s because if I’m going to eat candy, I’d rather have Lindor truffles than Snickers. If you’re going to go crazy, why waste it on inferior chocolate?

Or maybe it’s because I’ve never had a truly successful costume. Most people seem to have that one costume of which they are eternally proud, whether it was their second-grade princess get-up or last year’s Sarah Palin creation. I only have traumatic memories though, the earliest being in first-grade when my friend and I decided it would be a brilliant idea to dress up as die for Halloween. As in, we decided to each be a dice. Unfortunately, it became too difficult to walk from house to house with our bodies protruding from the holes we cut in huge boxes. So after 10 minutes, we paraded around the neighborhood in just white clothing, with our moms behind us holding up our boxes to show to any questioning door-openers proof that their children weren’t greedy little costumeless beggars.

When I was a little older, two of my friends and I dressed up as Charlie Brown, Snoopy and Woodstock. My Snoopy costume was rough enough for the three of us (think taped-on black construction paper ears), but it was really a sorry night for my friend who dressed up as Woodstock. Everyone thought she was a duck.

Then there was freshman year at Cornell. Halloween fell on the same weekend as parents’ weekend, as it does this year. I didn’t catch the memo to have an early dinner with your parents so that you could make it out before the lines to get into the frats went to Timbuktu. By the time we got back a couple of hours after our 8:30 dinner, everyone was out or on the way out, in full Halloween get-up and starry-eyed freshmen glory.

Now, it’s not like I had a brilliant costume planned. I just planned to be your run-of-the-mill cowgirl with pigtails and a bandanna. But I had planned to go out, and the feeling of getting back to your dorm after everyone has already left is not a good one. I knew that even if I got in contact with my friends and found out where they were, it would be difficult to find them, not to mention they could be at another frat before I got to the first one. I was faced with a choice. I could swallow my pride, walk to the frats by myself, and hope that I would run into people I knew. Or I could accept the fact that I had just had something for dinner other than RPC’s Mongo stir-fry and let that, in itself, make my night successful. I chose the second option.

So, unsuccessful costume number three: Not even putting on my costume at all.

There is one more aspect of Halloween that has always irked me. Halloween is an excuse for girls to be cliquey.

For as far back as I can remember, there was drama regarding who would go trick-or-treating with whom. In elementary school, I remember my mom telling me it was the right thing to invite a girl to trick-or-treat with my friends and me, even though I didn’t really like her.

The trick-or-treating issue is clearly not relevant among college-age girls, but extreme cliqueyness is still demonstrated by groups of girls who dress up together. It is the rare girl who decides to be a slutty princess, a slutty nurse or a slutty firefighter all by her lonesome: most often, they travel in packs. It’s almost as bad as trick-or-treating exclusiveness in second-grade.

I’m not saying that I won’t be joining a group of slutty somethings myself this Halloween. Honestly, I haven’t decided yet. Either way, what with the cliquey girls, my consistent failure to have a good costume and the lack of chocolate suited for my exceptionally pretentious taste buds, I am just not particularly excited for this day. My aunt and uncle are visiting this weekend, though, and I’m thinking of asking them if we can go out to dinner — at, say, 8:30.

Suzanne Baumgarten is a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences. Culturally Disinclined runs alternate Fridays. She can be reached at sbaumgarten@cornellsun.com.