My Mom just flew back to Chicago after spending a long weekend with me in NYC. Although I've lived here for nearly 3 years, this was her visit to see me. I realize she's been bogged down for the past 4 years as my Dad's care giver, but I was on the verge of feeling resentful. This weekend was the best gift she could possibly give me, and also give herself, since she too needed a vacation after all this time.

She arrived Thursday afternoon and spent the night at my apartment in Brooklyn. On Friday, she came to work with me, so I could show her around the museum and take her out for lunch, but then she came back and ended up exploring more exhibits until around 3:00pm. I met her at our hotel in Midtown after work, where we grabbed some Spanish tapas for dinner and then saw "American Idiot" on Broadway.

Saturday was pretty much a marathon of activity. We started the day at MoMA, then the American Folk Art Museum, and then headed down to Chinatown for a bit before hitting Union Square and finally going back up to Times Square.

My Mom left this morning after breakfast, so it was a short trip but definitely packed and enjoyable. I don't know if she'll be able to visit me in NYC again, but I'm so happy she was able to come when she did, so I could at least share with her a little piece of my life at this moment.

On my way to work this morning, I passed a sexy zombie stumbling out of a nightclub after a long night (and morning) of Halloween partying. In my humble opinion, the words "sexy" and "zombie" should never be used in the same sentence. I remember when Halloween costumes were supposed to look frightening, or at least disguise the person wearing it. Halloween (or Samhain for us Pagans), after all, is the time we honor those who have passed on, and welcome the coming winter as the summer has come to an end. It is believed that the tradition of dressing up for this holiday was to appease the evil spirits or impersonate the dead.

Sometime over the past few decades, the objective shifted. The goal is now for women to show as much cleavage and skin as possible. The shorter the skirt, the better. I don't necessarily understand how this became such a popular theme over the decades. I could say that the skank factor (yes, I made up a new term) that has become Halloween is the result of hook-up culture, but that would be inaccurate. As a young feminist, I should be thrilled that women feel comfortable enough with their bodies to display them for public viewing. I should be thrilled with women's sexual freedom and awareness. Overall, I am thrilled. However, I feel it's also possible to take anything to the extreme. Halloween traditions aside, I don't really think it's beneficial for women to prance down the street disguised as a sexy zombie, sexy nurse, sexy rainbow brite, or anything else with the word "sexy" tagged onto it. I would probably feel differently about all of this if sexual objectification and victim blaming wasn't so embedded in this society. Whenever I read about a woman who had been raped, there tends to be commentary regarding her style of dress. In a perfect world, or at least a more evolved one, women's clothing should never factor into a crime. Until then, I think the sexy costumes should be saved for the bedroom.