Halloween Happenings

Halloween night is close at hand, friends. And I feel that it has been a subject discussed more this year than in years past. Is it canceled, or isn’t it? What are the COVID Halloween protocols? How dare the government cancel a holiday, they can’t do that. Blah, blah, blah.

Also, to that chain of news outlets trying to Gretchen Weiner “Spooky Season,” you can put that right in the same basket as fetch. It’s not going to happen, so give up and let’s never ever speak of this again.

Halloween is right up at the top of my favorites list when it comes to holidays. So, you might think I’m one of those folks wringing my hands at news outlets and the government for suggesting Halloween be skipped this year. Nope, that’s not my bag. As much as I enjoy setting up the pumpkin patch and handing out candy, I get the high-risk activity label slapped on the tradition.

No meme depicting a drive-through or arguments stating we’ve been celebrating trick or treating for two hundred years is going to change my mind either.

Firstly, because the argument that we’ve been celebrating trick or treating for two hundred years is false. Mumming and guising, trick or treats progenitors, have been practiced since the 9th or 10th centuries. But, trick or treating as we know it is a relatively new concept as it didn’t take popular hold until after World War II. The term trick or treat didn’t even get into our lexicon until Charles Schultz, and The Peanuts came around.

We’re looking at about a seventy-year-old tradition. My parents are older than mainstream trick or treating. While seventy years is an accomplishment, in terms of traditions, I don’t think it has made it out of potty training yet.

As a side note, Tricks or treats, as Chuck would say, did start to evolve before the late forties and fifties. The Great Depression, with its sugar shortages, mass unemployment, and a general economic collapse, made everyone hit the pause button on a full rollout. Meaning there is certainly precedent for “canceling” a holiday because of serious shit going on in the world.

Secondly, grabbing a coffee from the drive-through window at Dunks is not the same as trick or treating. I know it looks it from the picture in the meme, but it’s not. Trick or treating is a highly social event.

Families and kids clump together in pods to walk around the block. Kids romping, laughing, and shrieking all the way. Parents strolling behind, having their own close conversations. Sometimes kids pile into the bed of a truck to be shuttled neighborhood to neighborhood. Cheating, in my opinion, but that’s not my point right now. Close conversation clusters pop up at doorways.

And then there are the kids reaching their hands into candy bowl after candy bowl. This is a practice I find weird and don’t allow when handing out candy, but many folks do. Anyone who’s been taken down by a bowl of snacking cashews or pickles at a holiday event with toddlers and kids understands the reservation, COVID, or not.

I don’t know about you, but my morning coffee run doesn’t look anything like that.

The vehemence for protecting the sanctity of Halloween on the interwebs has exposed something to me. Some people think that trick or treating is the sum total of Halloween. It is a holiday exclusively for children’s enjoyment. Well, if that isn’t ageism, I don’t know what is.

Trick or treating is a kid-specific facet of the holiday, to be sure. But come on, there’s more to Halloween than grabbing candy. If that’s all there was, I’m not sure why we have a holiday. Easter can carry the candy grabbing holiday mantle all by itself. Speaking of the Easter bunny, if candy is really what you like about October 31st, then I’d suggest busting out the eggs and doing a Halloween hunt.

I would argue that Halloween is the holiday best poised for a COVID celebration. The loss of trick or treating and costume parties is a bitter blow, but what’s to stop you from getting dressed up anyway? Give the sweats a break for a night and have a household costume night.

I’m only sort of kidding on this one. If you need a place to go with your costume, wear them apple picking or go for a walk with them on. I feel like that would brighten up other people’s day just as much as your own. Why do we need to restrict costumes to one night out of the year? I say we don’t.

Halloween celebrations in this house actually start closer to the beginning of October. This year they started on October 1st with a trip to the drive-in to see a Hocus Pocus – Beetlejuice ticket. In retrospect, watching a movie outside on a full moon wasn’t a great idea in terms of lighting. However, watching Hocus Pocus with a full moon hanging overhead added a little something to the movie.

We’ve been working our way through Halloween movies since. Dracula, Ghostbusters, Wallace and Gromit’s Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Zombieland, Sleepy Hollow, The Adventures of Icabod Crane, It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, Garfield’s Halloween Adventure, DTV Monster Hits, to name a few.

My list leans more toward the animated/comedic side of movies, but that doesn’t have to be the case. CJ’s been binging on the B horror movie scene this October, making her list has a lot more slashing than mine does. The point being, there’s plenty of options to keep your October creepy.

If you want to talk socially distanced, creative entertainment, pumpkin carving and painting fit the bill. Obviously, carving actual pumpkins can’t happen until close to the 31st unless you’ve got fridge space enough for a Pumpkin or two and have the gusto to keep moisturizing the pumpkins. Painting and opting to carve foam pumpkins, on the other hand, have no such time restrictions.

This might seem like another kid’s only endeavor. If that were true, why are wine and paint nights so popular? Pour a glass of wine and sit yourself down for some seasonal relaxation. If you don’t like how it comes out, well, that’s easily fixed. Smash open the gourd, take out the seeds, and roast them for snacks. Not my thing, but I know there’s a lot of folks out there who love them.

I would end the suggestions here, but something struck me. Just as I was about to close out the file and go in my merry way, I remembered another activity that can be worked into Halloween. Baking cookies.

True, the idea came from when I was a kid. I’d chalk up the cookie making and decorating to Mom needing something to keep me occupied. Still, I have a sneaking suspicion she liked it as much as I did.

As the weather is shifting, at least here on the East Coast, there are bound to be colder, wetter days perfect for busting out a sugar cookie recipe or a Pillsbury roll of dough. Fun and satisfaction from baking don’t require kids. I mean, even if you don’t like the decorating part, you still end up with cookies to munch on. A win-win situation if you ask me.

Halloween doesn’t begin and end with trick or treating. I’ll concede the point this Halloween is going to look a lot different than year’s past. There’s no trek to Lake Compounded or performance of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow to go see for us. I’m still going to put up the Pumpkin Patch as it can still be enjoyed from a safe distance. And who knows, maybe The Great Pumpkin will swing by.

Halloween comes without Kit Kat’s. It comes without Sweet Tarts, Rolos, and Whoopers. It comes without Snickers and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups- no, no, no. Too far, there. Halloween has to have those. But you get my drift.