I view Halloween as a kids's day - a day for kids to put on their fantasies and play to them. As an adult, my fantasies aren't camouflaged in costumes. My fantasies involve time alone and/or time with good friends. I don't want to have to pretend to be a witch or a lego or an 80's aerobic instructor. I just wanna be me. I don't want to spend ANY time looking for a suitable costume. I don't care about it.
Additionally think Halloween is yet another example of a cool little thing gone way over the top. Trick or treating in your immediate neighborhood for a half an hour or so is great. It was fun as a kid to go to the homes of the neighbors and let them comment on your costume. But when kids come back to their homes after canvassing the town for two or three hours and they have pillowcases of poison, that's just plain wrong. I used to feel as if Halloween belongs to little kids only and 12 was about the cut off age. I must admit that I have changed my mind about that and I think trick or treating is fine for older kids - IF they do their part and wear a costume. I never bother to make a comment though if a kid didn't wear a costume. I just think what a loser that kid is.
Perhaps the key word here is simplicity. If Halloween could have stayed just a one night thing (or even just a one week thing) for kids, I might have continued to enjoy it. Perhaps it is my cynicism operating but I am keenly aware of the marketing behind Halloween (and Christmas and Valentine's Day and Mother's Day and all the rest). I hate feeling manipulated into buying bags of poison to hand out to anyone coming to the door. I hate being manipulated into wearing a costume and pretending this is all very cool. I DO enjoy little kids living out their imaginations and pretending to be something new - how fun! I DO like a little infusion of fall colors here and there. I just don't want to be pushed into the whole charade.
Trick or treaters? What's are those? Oh, yeah. We had a couple come here once, back in 1987. I am a fan of the Orange and Black all right, The San Francisco Giants. You could give out Giants pencils for halloween; kids might think that was OK. Don't you think that as kids we were out for a minimum of two hours?
ReplyDeleteI was never out for two hours - way back we got to go down Fellowship to Walnut and then back up Fellowship to Hartview - that whole distance might have taken 35 minutes. In later years, we were allowed to move over to Doublegrove and Dubesor but the down to Walnut got cut out (too many non participants) -- maybe an hour and a half at the most - I dont recall going anywhere else. I bailed on the whole thing around age 12 - at which time I started going as the babysitter for the younger kids.
ReplyDeleteIt just goes to show that I was no more into time back then, than I am now. I have no recollection of when I stopped going around, but certainly by age thirteen, because i was working for Augie by then. I guess it would also have made a difference as to whether I went with the younger kids or not. BTW thanks for the name of Walnut; I couldn't think of it when I wrote the piece on the library. Fellowship to Walnut to Vine. I also did not realize how restricted our candy-canvasing was. Makes sense, though. Do you remember going home, spreading the loot on the kitchen table, and divvying it up? What a concept. That's one that I agree with.
ReplyDeleteFor sure I remember emptying all the bags on the kitchen table - sorting everything and then redistributing - mama making sure that a goodly amount of the chocolate pieces ended up on the pile for papa - and no one complaining at all about that (or about any of the dividing up of the spoils). It was the way things were done and it felt right. I completely agreed with it then and now.
ReplyDeleteCheech and Chong were right: You got something the other guy don't, you share man. I share my shirt, man. We shared our candy, man. It was all good and no one whined. Otherwise, you might get invited back next year, and we believed that.
ReplyDeleteAs a younger trick or treater, I do remember feeling a little miffed at the idea that the candy Tom and I had gathered was being divvied up between EVERYONE, and not always so evenly in my eyes! But, I went along with the program because it was the only way we were allowed to go. It felt just like the concept of "community order", one that I always thought was unfair. And, in reality, it never panned out for me as I never got first choice on anything!
ReplyDeleteBut, it was all good.
Although I would bet my whole share of Halloween candy that you, Warp, unlike JT, managed to get beyond the confines of Hartview and Walnut. I would also venture to guess that you may have been out more than two hours. It's just a hunch. Park
ReplyDeleteI support that hunch, Park....
ReplyDelete