Trick-or-Treat?

Well, it’s Halloween Time! Whether I like it or not it is time for all the little kiddies and not so young teenagers to come knocking at our doors. Fortunately, I live out in the country and for the past several years this has kept the number of knocks down to a minimum. In fact, over the last several years I have had less that 20 trick-or-treaters combined.

I have learned that due to my remote location I still need to stock up with something. The rare child, transported by some parent that might or might not know me, is dropped off at the end of my driveway to come a knocking. A quick treat and back into the car they get and away they go. In the dark I am not sure whose kid that was.

This year looks like it will be different. I noticed a sign posted at an intersection near me that area neighbors and their costumed kids are invited to attend a Halloween bon-fire on Saturday evening. Then, afterwards they plan to trick-or-treat through the area homes. Maybe I need to stock up on more candy this year?

I grew up in the days that Halloween was fun. You went through the neighborhood knocking on everybody’s door, even people you didn’t know. There was no worry about what you might get, everything was safe. And, you could do “tricks” if you needed too and not get in trouble. If you found a neighbor with their lights out, and you knew they were home, you could always TP their tree. How about soaping the car windows? That was fine. Place Doggie-do in the burning paper bag on the front doorstep and ring the bell on the grumpy old man down the street? Not a problem. I got to admit they didn’t like “egging” a house. It smelled too bad in a day or so.

Now, your parents follow along to check every new treat you receive and to make sure you don’t get in trouble. You have one “safe” bag in the car and one bag to carry from door to door. Every couple of doors your carry bag is checked and the ok stuff goes into your safe bag. The unsafe candies are placed in a trash bag for disposal. Another problem is that if you do something wrong, like the tricks I listed above, you risk having your parents pick you up at the local police station.

My kids are grown now and soon (hopefully not too soon) will have kids of their own. When my kids were younger, I lived in the big city. Halloween there was for the adults. Halloween Party attendees were all adults who wore serious costumes, most quite expensive, to most of the events. Kids on the other hand were restricted in trick-or-treating at a few trusted neighbors’ homes, then off to the mall to trick-or-treat from store to store.

And the mall scene was sad. A long line of kids going from store to store and all they get for their efforts is a lousy piece of candy. Most kids didn’t even say “Trick-or-treat”. The line went down one side of the mall and up the other hitting several stores with each line while another ran on the other side of the mall.

Call me a Halloween Scrooge. I think society has killed Halloween, at least for the kids. Now it is only for the candy companies selling tons of sugar to overweight kiddies. Maybe we should bury Halloween and forget about it?

Warning! The holiday season is upon us. Don’t get me started on that, yet.