The Scrooge of Halloween

I hope you guys don't mind, but since we've already had a few posts about Halloween costumes, I thought I'd talk about something a little bit different: the evolution of what I've done for Halloween over the years.

The Christian/Secular Blend (age from "as early as I can remember" to about middle school)
I come from a family that felt wary about Halloween. It was the mixed emotion feeling that on one hand, the whole occasion was doused in the occult and was a bad influence - the same reasoning that meant I didn't get to read Harry Potter until I started sneaking it in high school :( - but trick-or-treating is pretty wide spread and it feels strange to outright not do it and not allow kids to dress up.

So we hit a compromise; we'd trick-or-treat the night of Halloween, but we also went to a local fall or harvest festival. Kids run around in their costumes, often there are game booths and people giving out candy, and the whole thing is remarkably similar to Halloween except, er, not? Halloween was weird as a kid.

The "I'm Not Too Old!" Stage (middle school through the first half of high school)
After feeling left out of most Halloween stuff as a kid - partially due to parental influence, and partially because I was homeschooled and didn't have many friends - I tried desperately to hold on to Halloween as long as I could.

I remember dressing up in group theme outfits and running around the rich neighborhoods (they give out full size candy bars!), with at least one person losing a shoe or accessory, or falling down somewhere since the rich neighborhoods invariably have hills. Our rewards were a copious amount of blurry photos, enough candy to keep us hyper until Thanksgiving, and experiences to laugh and make jokes about for the rest of the year.

The Working Years (junior year of high school until about last year)

I had a string of food service jobs during and after high school, and every year I forgot to take Halloween night off. Or, if I didn't, I was so fried from school and work that I just took it as a regular night off and plopped into bed.

I remember one year when I wasn't working that night, I had just dyed my hair, and came into work to get my check before starting my homework. When asked what I was for Halloween, I claimed that I was dressed up as my evil twin.

My sense of humor has not gotten better with age :P

I'm Old! (now)

So now, finally, I'm at the point where I don't have to work nights, I'm out of school, and theoretically have some disposable income.

And I still don't really celebrate Halloween.

This year, I didn't even get off work until 7, was a 45 minute drive from where my friends were, and lacking a costume for reasons described before. Since we're all of legal age, we decided to go out to one of our favorite bars since they have delicious and wide-ranging flavors of long island iced teas, and we figured we'd get one, then wander around downtown for a bit.

Of course, we didn't think about the fact that this is a college town, so the whole scene was packed and too loud to have any sort of conversation. After silently sipping our teas and occasionally nudging each other to point out costumes, we headed to a slightly quieter town favorite and hung out until it started getting rowdy.

As I drove* home that evening, all I could think was: "Wow, I may officially be old."

It's funny, because in theory I quite enjoy Halloween: it promises the chance to dress up, possibly even making a costume, and hang out with people I'd probably hang out with anyway, plus an opportunity to indulge in candy. However, as I wrote this I realized that I may inadvertently be a Halloween Scrooge!

I may need to put some forethought into what I do next year; I realize that part of the problem is that Halloween sneaks up on me while I'm not prepared. Hope all of you had a great All Hallows Eve!



*since I know my mom occasionally reads this, I would just like to reassure her that this was several hours later and long after the effect of alcohol had worn off.