Halloween is coming and I am ready. I have my witch’s cauldron filled with treats for trick or treaters. The ghosts are ready to light the pathway to my door. The pumpkins are stacked in a corner with lights peering through their smiles. I have my witch costume just waiting for me to don it. Of course I am a good witch who smiles with each child that comes to my door.
I am always amazed at how intricate the costumes of the trick or treaters have become. Nobody shows up with an old sheet with cut out eyes like kids used to wear. There are none of those creepy plastic masks paired with suits painted to look like a princess or a pirate. The kids of today look as though they are extras in a multi million dollar movie that skimps on nothing including the costumes. I am in awe of how remarkable they are.
I always loved Halloween when I was a kid. More often than not I dressed like a hobo or concocted a female pirate outfit with long skirts and a scarf tied around my head. Sometimes I’d just don some jeans and put on a cowboy hat. We had be ingenious back in the day but nobody noticed because none of the costumes were outstanding. The main point was to go from house to house filing our paper grocery store bags with goodies.
I went to Catholic School and All Saints Day, which landed on November 1, was always a holiday so that we might attend mass. That meant we could stay out as late as we wanted and of course we did. I lived in a rather isolated neighborhood where everybody seemed to know everybody else. We would keep going block after block until the adults closed their doors and turned the lights out. My mother would stay home to pass out candy so we were on our own and nobody worried about us. There were other moms constantly watching over all of us as we made our way from block to block.
Once my brothers and I returned home my mother had a ritual that we had to endure. She would upturn our bags and spread our loot on the living room floor inspecting each item to determine if we might keep it or not. Anything that was not securely packaged had to go. None of the homemade goodies passed her quality control. Sometimes we looked in sorrow as items that made our mouth’s water hit the garbage can. We never complained because we understood that she was just making sure that we did not consume something that might make us sick. We heard some creepy stories from other kids about items containing glass or razor blades but I never actually knew anyone who found such things. I often believed that those stories were just part of Halloween folklore.
Many years later when my two girls were young an horrific man poisoned his son with a pixie stick. At first he tried to blame it on one of his neighbors but the police ultimately found that he had opened the end of a pixie stick and placed poison inside. Luckily only one of his children consumed the tainted sweets. His horrific action ruined Halloween for a very long time. The big crowds of children coming to the house went down to a trickle after that. As a mom I began to be more cautious like my mother had been. My husband and I would take turns walking with our children as they scurried from place to place. More and more churches and schools and neighborhoods started having confined ways of treating the kids like parties and trunk or treat gatherings.
For some reason the children still come in massive numbers in my neighborhood. They are always accompanied by adults who sometimes even walk to the doors with them. I use packaged candy and toss any that has defective closures. I light up my home and greet everyone with a smile hoping that they will realize that they need not be afraid. I haven’t heard of anything terrible happening of late but I suppose that parents will always have to be careful.
The yearly tradition on October 31 usually ends much earlier than when I was a child. By nine the only visitors who come are the teens who don’t even bother to wear costumes. They are always polite and appreciative so I actually like that they are still enjoying the fun times of childhood before they will be way too old for such things.
If I end up with leftover candy I evenly distribute it to the children that I homeschool and tutor. They very gladly help me make good use of whatever is left. Of course my husband and I sneak a few things ourselves even as we both know that we would do well to watch our weight. I suppose the kid in us never really goes away.
