Somewhere along the line I fell out of love with Halloween.
I used to love Trick-or-Treating when I was a kid. I think it's different when you grow up in a small town. We used to hit just about every house, filling up a pillow case with candy, no doubt to the delight of the dentists in town.
The only thing that slowed us down was several neighbors who insisted on inviting us into their homes as they tried to figure out who we were.
Back then we almost never had store-bought costumes. With a little bit of burned cork, mom would magically turn us into 'hobos' and off we would go.
There's something else that was different back then. We never had adult accompaniment. As usual, mom figured we were in town somewhere, but in reality she had no idea where we were - or what we were up to, which is probably a good thing.
But now Halloween doesn't do a thing for me.
Oh, I will still man the door tonight and hand out candy. But the day has lost its magic for me.
Maybe it's because every kid is accompanied by an adult. Or maybe it's the high schoolers who insist on pushing the age limit.
Actually, I think I know what it is.
I can feel it in the air.
It's not so much tonight, it's what is coming.
Winter.
Four long months of cold, dreary weather.
We "fall back" this weekend, gaining an hour of sleep Saturday night. The trade-off is that I now get the privilege of driving to work in the dark, and doing the same on the ride home.
Call me in April.
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