Darkness falls accross the land, the Midnight hour is close at hand....Vincent Price from "Thriller"

Whooo! Eeeee! Whooo! Eeeee! It's that creepy, crawly, bumps in the night time of year, Halloween! Bowls of candy corn and peanut butter chews, jack-o-lanterns glowing faces on front porches, spiderwebs, bats, black cats, witches, goblins, skeletons, monsters and such, all mean one of my favorite "holidays". Halloween is one of the biggest "retail" holidays of the year, after Christmas. When driving around, more people decorate for Halloween every year. I love those big blow-up "characters" in yards, they spell "Halloween". When I was a child, I simply couldn't wait for Halloween. We would usually dress up in whatever we could find in my grandparents old trunk, add some creepy make-up and you were set. Back in the "olden days", as my kids called it, the only stores that Halloween costumes could be purchased at were K-Mart or Loys Dime store, uptown Gibson City. Now these costumes consisted of a plastic outfit with a tie at the back of the neck and included a plastic mask with cut-out holes for your nose, eyes, and mouth. The eye holes never quite lined up with your own, and after breathing through the mask for a few minutes, condensation from your breath would cover the inside of the mask, very comfortable indeed! And, don't forget the rubber, stretchy cord in the back that held the mask on your head, that usually broke after you had it on the first five minutes. Yeah, those costumes were wonderful! NOT! We found out after having these a few times, it was much more fun and comfortable to find "old clothes" at Grandma's and Grandpas! Alot cheaper too! We also didn't have those wonderful plastic pumpkin candy holders with a handle. No sir, we had old grocery bags, that worked just fine and they held lots more candy! No fancy flashlights either! What's a Halloween without at least one free-fall off a curb or down some steps when you couldn't see?
If you didn't come home with at least one skinned knee or hand it wasn't Halloween! We would load up in the car and head for Anchor, where our Grandparents lived to descend upon the little village to collect our hoard of candy. Mom would stay at Grandma's to visit while we took off in search of candy. In those days, we knew every house and who inhabited said home, along with where every child lived, and there were lots of kids, back then. We were very methodical and would end up hitting every house in that town, and all by 10:00. Yes, we stayed out trick-or-treating till 10:00. There was nothing to worry about, no one had to check our candy and we even got home-made popcorn balls! My grandmas' next-door neighbor always had home-made popcorn balls, so that was always the first place we went, cause when they were gone, they were gone! Those were the days! When we were finished, we had soo much candy, we could stuff our faces for weeks! We always hid our stash when we got home in a secret place, from brothers and sisters, and especially our parents! Even back then, yes, parents would get in their kids bags and take out their favorite candy! Where do you think I learned this? So, when my own kids came home, I always took their candy into the kitchen, to check it out to make sure it was safe, while secretly stashing away my favorites. Now don't tell me that you didn't do that, because parents have been doing this since the beginning of time, and don't deny it! I kind of feel sorry for kids today, because they don't have the freedom that we had as kids and my parents didn't have the worry that I had, and as parents have today. Some really bad adults caused this many years ago and it still makes me mad every time I think of it. Now parents have to follow set trick or treat hours, lights have to be on front porches to signal that it is alright to "trick or treat" there. Parents have to check through candy to make sure it is safe. Some people think it is not right for a child to dress up in any costume that is scary or evil. Just why do adults have to try to impose their beliefs on kids at Halloween? Halloween to me as a child meant one thing and one thing only, it was a night for kids to dress-up in the costume of their "choice" and go out and let people try to guess who you were and give you candy. That's it, that's what it meant, and if you ask most kids, they'll tell you that's what it means to them. A night to dress-up, be something or somebody they usually aren't, have fun, run around and get lots of candy. I never quite understood people calling it "begging". We never begged, we laughed and said, as loud as we could, "trick or treat". We never tricked anybody, cause everybody gave us candy and we wouldn't have thought to do anything, except go to the next house, if they had ran out of candy or said they didn't have any. End of story. One thing that used to go on that seems to have stopped or at least diminished somewhat, is the smashing of pumpkins. The year our daughter was born, we had a medium sized jack-o-lantern for our son and a little bitty jack-o-lantern for her. That Halloween evening, some pranksters came by and snatched the little jack-o-lantern and smashed it in front of our house. Our son was so upset over this and I don't think he ever forgot it and never would go out smashing pumpkins. Every Halloween when he went out with his friends, I would always remind him of how upset he was the year the little pumpkin was smashed and he always said, "I remember mom, I'd never do that to some little kid". Some lessons are learned and remembered. One year we had a "special" Halloween party at our home, the kids were 8 and 4 and they were allowed to each have 4 friends over for apple bobbing, pin the heart on the ghost, pizza, and candy, dressing up, spooky music, and scary stories. It was a very fun Halloween indeed! The kids still talk about their "Halloween party". So parents, remember Halloween as it should be, a night for your kids to dress-up, use their imaginations, have fun, run around, get candy, jump, yell, and just be kids. Halloween is truly a night for your kids to just be kids. And being a kid doesn't last as long as it should! Eat a popcorn ball or a candy apple, play some scary music, decorate your house, carve a jack-0-lantern with your kids, have a party, put on a scary movie (not too scary, you don't want them up all night), let them have some friends spend the night, go all out! Have a great Halloween everybody! Whooo! Eeeeee! Whoooo! Eeeeeee!