What would Halloween be without a mad scientist frisking about? What would it be without blinking lights, test tubes with slimy things dripping out of them, and flasks with strange things growing inside?
Each Halloween until I was 11, my dad patiently led me and my siblings around our Bronx neighborhood as I begged for treats, disguised as a space alien with three rows of teeth, a mutant strawberry with 30 eyes, or anything else my budding pre-scientist mind could dream up, aided by my mom’s sewing, cutting, and pasting skills.
Some years I even dressed as a “normal scientist” draped in a white lab coat, accompanied by a miniature female “Igor-type” assistant, who was usually one of my pre-teen paramours. This year I am not going to wear the white lab coat with a long white beard and have gooey things reaching out of my pockets to scare people. This Halloween I am going to try something brand new, something that occurred to me as I was teaching a biology class recently.
I was giving a lecture about one-celled organisms that reproduce by dividing in two, and I used a song, as I sometimes do, to help students remember scientific minutiae. The lyrics I used to describe the ever lovelorn amoeba were, “I was split in a dish by a parent who left me there…” sung to the tune of Aldonza’s song from “Man of La Mancha.”
Aldonza, the low-life street woman who is exalted in the eyes of Don Quixote, sings, “I was spawned in a ditch by a mother who left me there” to beg him to open his eyes and see her as she really is: A prostitute, not a noblewoman. First I thought, why not dress this Halloween as an amoeba and ooze shapelessly down the street while crooning a biology song? And then I thought, why not go as Aldonza and sing the original Broadway hit? Now that would be something.
Now for a solo
Having made the decision, I offered up my services to perform as Aldonza at my school’s annual Halloween potluck supper. I have never sung a solo in front of an audience, let alone appeared as a transvestite. Looking ridiculous, I reasoned, would give me the courage to warble an aria from one of my favorite musicals. As a scientist, I can relate perfectly to the timeless Don Quixote, a middle-aged man of modest means who suddenly declares himself a “knight-errant” and sets out in search of adventure with his trusted servant Sancho Panza always at his side and trying to ground him in reality.
Cervantes’ 17th century “Don” sees dragons where there are squirrels, knights where there are beggars, princesses where there are prostitutes, and giants where there are windmills. “I must engage these monsters in fierce combat!” he bellows at the windmills, while Sancho gently but insistently chides him for his delusions.
Is Don Quixote so different from a scientist peering into a microscope who sees beauty where others see sludge, or who sees miracles where others perceive the mundane? My Aldonza costume is an outlandish black number that clings mercilessly to my overweight but manly shape and glaringly middle-aged flaws. This flagrant attire will be literally topped off by a sublimely Halloweenish blonde wig that looks like Dolly Parton’s hair on a bad day.
On Halloween I can scare myself if I want to, and it is very scary indeed not only to be making my solo singing debut as a woman, but trying to stay on pitch too. What is even scarier is that I will be singing along with a pre-recorded accompaniment, and if my voice wanders too far astray it could elicit some laughter for the wrong reasons. Like Don Quixote, I sometimes fight dragons that may never appear.
Still, I think I am to be commended for being either brave, or foolish, or both. After all, I have finally mustered up the courage to open my mouth and put a song where there is usually a science lecture. So, if you happen to hear me humming my lines in and around Hoboken, please give me a thumbs-up or at least a nod. Humor me. – Dr. Steven Wool
Dr. Steven Wool is on the science faculty at The Hudson School in Hoboken. Comments on this piece can be sent to: current@hudsonreporter.com.