It’s too bad adults don’t get to go trick or treating. We could all trek up to Clay’s door …but we would just yell, “Treats only” when he opened it, wouldn’t we?
Most women love to dress up. And we could be as outrageous as we always wanted to dress and no one would make snide remarks about being “cheap”. We could wear great wigs….long straight black Cher ones, or pink ‘60s pageboys, or white spiky Billy Idol ones …at one time or another all these appealed to me but i have always been too repressed coughanalretentativecough to really express my true inner self. That must be why i love the internet and message boards so much….you don’t know me….i can be anybody i want to be. My Space is really great for that. I’m young and tall there…but i digress.
We’re talkin’ Halloween here, right. Remember when there were no such things as store-bought costumes??? You were a hobo or wore your mother’s clothes….that was about it. But nobody worried about razors in apples then either.
The Halloween that will always stand out in my mind is the year i begged and begged my mother to let me wear her dangly rhinestone earrings with one of her fancier dresses and high heels (now these were her very nicest earrings, mind you) and she refused. But being the persistent only-child i was, i bugged her until she relented.
Of course, i lost one of them somewhere along my route. I just hated to go home that night. Not that i was afraid i would be punished, because i knew i wouldn’t be. But because i knew how hurt she would be….to lose that favorite earring…and that i had been so careless after i had promised and promised how careful i would be. Nothing hurts a child like that “mother guilt thing” does it? I use it on my kids all the time now..
The only other Halloween i really remember was the last one. My girlfriend and i must have been thirteen or fourteen….still young enough to want to get as much candy as we could (girls didn’t grow up so quickly then, obviously)….but aware enough of our age and height to be a little self-conscious. I remember we had a great time and were amassing great quantities of calories when we went to the last house we ever went to (these momentous occasions need to be documented, ya know). The woman gave us candy, but guess she just couldn’t help herself from ruining our evening, “Aren’t you girls a little old for this?”
Now i wonder what would prompt her to say that to two young girls. She ruined this holiday for us forever. Maybe she had had a bad day herself, maybe she was just tired from answering the door bell, maybe she was just a frustrated old bitch. I’m sure she had problems of her own (all adults do). But my girlfriend and i didn’t understand that. We only knew we had been slapped in the face. The candy really didn’t even taste too good that night. We felt ashamed that we had been going door to door and embarassing ourselves and didn’t even know it.
When my kids were little we lived in a great neighborhood and i made all their costumes. The best was the robot - two cardboard boxes spray painted silver with wire antennae on top. By that time, i always accompanied them on their forages(maybe even stole a snickers bar once in a while when they weren’t looking). Anyway, the neighbors would always invite us all in and they would oooooh and aaaah over their costumes and the kids would just preen with pride.
What memories! Now the only trick-or-treater i have is when my daughter-in-law drives over with my grandson and i have a special bag made just for him and we take pictures of him. All the neighborhood kids go to the mall and go from store to store now. I understand completely. Parents have to be so careful in these troubled times.
But still…….i always wonder who found that rhinestone earring and what they did with it.
It’s just me, geni
5 comments:
Halloween is great! As mom or granny I don't have to cook an elaborate meal, don't have to clean the house, don't have house guests, and I don't even have to be nice.
I'm thinking 'way back to about 1967 or 68 when my children were quite young and we lived in the very small town of Richland, Missouri. My daughter, Karen, and some of the kids from her Methodist Sunday School class were Trick or Treating for UNICEF. They went from door to door as usual and were received with not only money for UNICEF, but treats and compliments for being such good kids. Well, that is until they knocked on the door of the wealthiest (and I guess grouchiest) man in town. After they went through their UNICEF spiel the man at the door began to yell at them. Karen's account of the situation was that he got very red in the face and began to scold them for asking for money; then he got angrier and angrier. He informed the kids that there were people right here in the U.S. that needed food, and that until our own were taken care of it was wrong to be sending money out of the country. I guess he went on and on which really frightened the youngsters. It totally spoiled their happy day since none of them had ever been yelled at before. I would bet my bottom dollar that that old grouch gave precious little to hungry children in the U.S. Well, how boring was that! Ann
I remember the Halloween it snowed. No one would let us is and it was cold. We would jump up and down on the porches in the U. E. village. Went as a group so they only had to go to the door once. Skeet
Yes I decorate for Halloween. My two grandsons like Halloween almost as much as Christmas and the more gruesome something is the better. The flag I have is a skull with a top hat that has a rose on it. I remember the Halloween that Chris was just a few months old, Michael was a ghost and Chris was a pea in a pod. Both were so little and so cute.
Naomi
Since we moved here (10 years, my how time really does fly) we haven't received one trick or treater down our little lake road. We used to have a young family on the second tier and I would make special bags for them and go with them to the stores but they moved and grew. Now my neighbor has a grand daughter and I do the same. I really miss having the kids. I used to wear a funny hat or nose or something like that and put a little hat on my then puppy who seemed to know all the kids coming over. Tina and I had a great time. Oh well.
I remember bringing my son to your house one Hallowen.
You didn't expect anyone, but had a bag of after dinner mints that you gave him.
No one trick or treated at the Lake back then.
This was before the malls, etc.
I certainly remember my early Halloweens.
This was before the "fun-sized" candy bars.
I don't think there is much fun to them. I liked the big candy and the fudge and pop corn balls, etc.
So much for modern times!
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