Halloween

I'm glad Halloween is over.  I've never liked it.  Not even as a kid.  When I was young, there was no question what I would be dressing up as.  I'd be a witch.  We had two witch masks, one witch dress, and one cape.  My sister and I were always witches.  Somehow I always ended up with the cape and never the dress.  I really wanted the dress.  When it was my year for the dress, my sister would trick me out of it.  I look back on this and wonder how.  I'm smarter than she is.  By far.  Bless her heart.

We moved when I was 6 years old from suburbia to Ruralville. Okay, that's not really the name but you get the gist.  Halloween was spent walking to houses a quarter mile apart, ringing the doorbell, and being rewarded with a bite size tootsie roll or smarties.  We'd come home after two hours of begging with 12 pieces of candy - none of them candy bars. 

One year we went to a house and the guy yelled at us.  Said he didn't believe in Halloween then slammed the door in our faces.  I heard he died a few years ago.  I didn't cry.

When I had children, I did the whole planning ahead for Halloween costumes.  The year I had my second daughter 10 days before Halloween, I had already sewn my older daughter's costume and bought the appropriate color of tights.  I hated it but I had to play the game. 

The past few years have been particularly delightful.  The kids tell me what they want to be for Halloween and a couple of them (okay, just one) has very specific ideas in their (her) head.  I scour ever Target, Walmart, Shopko, Kohl's and resort to internet and nothing is just right.  They (she) finally concedes on a costume, I order it, pay shipping, it arrives the day before Halloween and they've (she's) changed her mind and wants something else the day before Halloween. 

At school there is always a Halloween party and parade.  We can't celebrate Christmas at school and sing religious songs but we can dress up as satanic, damned souls and carry a pitchfork, glorifying the other extreme. 

Okay, the real issue is that I feel guilty if I don't take time off work so I can see the costume parade.  Trust me, I've seen the costume.  I sewed/ordered/pinned the costume.  I feel nostalgic when all I had for my costume was a witch mask.  Every. Single. Year.

Now neighborhoods do "Trunk or Treats."  That's where people park their cars/minivans/Suburbans and the kids go down one street and make out like a bandit in 30 minutes.  If you're the people who give out one bite size tootsie roll, the other parents know it.  Trunk or Treat is a strike of pure genius. 

This year everybody (except the one) came up with a costume from all the crap we have in the dress-up bucket.  Even the one found most of her costume there, too.  Both daughters offered to take the 5 year old trick or treating.  The oldest one offered because she knows she's too old to go herself but people offer candy to her, anyway.  Smart girl. 

I stayed at home. I didn't sew.  I didn't go to Partyland.  I didn't wear a witch mask.  My kids came home with an incredible amount of candy.  Hence, I have quite a selection of candy stash to steal choose.

I don't hate Halloween, anymore.