Halloween Certainly Has Changed
Way back in the days when vampires used to be scary instead of sexy….
Halloween was a different beast.
In elementary school, we would get dressed up in our costumes and march around the different classrooms in the Halloween parade. We scarfed down orange frosted cupcakes and candy right in the middle of the school day. Man, that was really living!
Going Trick or Treatin’ back in the day was also very different than today. It was an art form.
I lived smack dab in the middle of suburbia. Our house was situated within a continual maze of friendly streets and adjoining neighborhoods. We would carefully map out the best route for the most possible coverage. This of course would insure that we would come home with a giant sack of Halloween goodness. We would travel which seemed like miles away from our house to accomplish this.
Every year we made it a point to visit the trick or treatin’ hot spots. Like the lady who always came to the door with a bowl of nickles. She used to let us grab as many as we can with one try. For some reason I can’t see that happening today, nor would kids think that it would be much of big deal to get nickles. Well, quarters maybe. *snicker*
I remember dressing up as a gypsy EVERY single year and wearing the same skirt which was passed down from my two older sisters. The costume was topped off with a kerchief on my head worn sideways, a single gold earring sewn to the kerchief and two circles of rouge on my face. (not very PC back in those days)
Every year my mother would add a few extra buttons and bells to the skirt so it would jingle when I walked ran from house to house. It really didn’t matter what my costume looked like, since my mother ALWAYS made me wear my coat over it. Of course this annoyed me to no end and sweat would always pour down my face from wearing too many clothes.
I remember one year my mother actually broke down and bought me a costume, after caving in to my sad puppy dog eyes. We were never allowed to bug my parents for things, and I always cringed when my father would say “well..we’ll see”. That used to drive me totally nuts.
At the department store I picked out my favorite costume out of the stack of boxes on the table, and my mother gave me the very serious ”ARE YOU SURE?”
I nodded my head yes like a bobble head doll. Needless to say, I was beside myself with joy.
Looking back, I get so silly when I think about that costume today. It was either a princess or cinderella costume, I don’t think the box even specified. It was nothing more than a shiny piece of blue fabric cut into a square which had a slit in the back at the top of the neck with strings to tie it closed. And it probably cost all of $2.98, if that.
“The gown” had yellow lines painted down the front to give the illusion that it had some sort of shape, and to make it look more ”gown like”. The plastic mask that came with it had blonde hair with pink painted lips that sported an eternal smile. It really was a piece of crap. But to me, this costume was the creme de la creme.
I remember I could hardly eat my dinner that night, as I knew trick or treating was just an hour away and I had visions of fellow trick or treaters ooohing and ahhhing over my magestic costume and I couldn’t wait to show it off.
I hurriedly gobbled down my dinner and put on my costume AND my coat, *grumble* grabbed my pillow case and bolted out the door with my sisters. By the time I got to the end of the driveway, I noticed that trying to see out of my princess mask was going to be quite the challenge, especially in the dark. My eyelashes were rubbing up against the eye holes which of course were cut way too small. I didn’t notice any problem before when I tried it on in the house in the bathroom mirror. I guess I was too busy admiring the mask and did not pay attention to it’s functionality. Besides, I didn’t want my mother to think that I had made a bad choice.
My mask problems coupled with the fact that I was running in a tube sock shaped gown and trying to keep up with my sisters, didn’t make trick or treating very easy. By the time I got to the forth house, I was struggling to climb the stairs. Mainly because I just couldn’t see the stairs through the slits in that stupid mask. A layer of sweat was starting to form between my face and the mask and the elastic was already starting to tangle in my hair every time I adjusted it, which was every five minutes. I was no longer liking my princess costume and I found myself wishing that I had worn that dern gypsy skirt again.
But all that seemed to dissapear into the night as my pillow case bulged with precious candy.
FREE CANDY!
Going back home with my “loot” for the evening, I always had mixed emotions. Should I have gone down one more street? Maybe get one more Crunch bar?
Of course since my sisters were much older, many times they would drop me off and go back out. But that didn’t bother me. I was sweaty, tired and looking forward to the best part of the evening …
which was the almighty candy sort.
Apples (why did people hand out apples?) and unwrapped candy were tossed immediately and all the yucky candy like Mary Janes and “old people hard candy” was thrown in the “icky” pile. My Dad always had dibbs on the Hershey candy bars with almonds, but I didn’t mind one bit. It wasn’t my favorite candy bar back then.
I think my favorite candy bars as a child were Milky Ways and Nestle Crunch Bars. Besides my other candy favorites, which were Candy Dots, Twizzlers, Chuckles, (not the green one) Good n Plenty, Pixie Stix, and Jujubes. I never liked the wax whistles and lips. I couldn’t understand why kids would chew on those huge balls of wax. Yuck! Even back then I thought that was gross.
Ironically today, my favorite candy bar is the Hershey bar with almonds. I find it’s simplicity equisite. *snicker*
But Good n Plenty and Twizzlers are still very dear to my heart.
So back to the trick or treating after glow….
My parents would let me choose a few pieces of candy to eat and then it was off to bed. Another one of my favorite holidays was done for the year. But at least the candy would last for weeks.
These days, I don’t hand out candy on Halloween any more.
I used to.
I would make trays of goodie bags stuffed with candy and even dressed up to hand the candy out. But now I only make goodie bags for the little ones in my neighborhood of the families of whom I am friendly with.
I stopped handing out candy when I noticed that there were really BIG and much older kids that were trick or treating. College kids. Most of these older kids didn’t even wear costumes when they came to my door. Apparently to them, wearing a “hoodie” with the hood up was considered costume.
Some of the kids, although younger, were being dropped off by their parents by CAR. An SUV would pull up on the corner of our street and about 5-8 kids would jump out. Can you imagine that? Trick or treating by car? That’s all I would have to do is ask my parents to drive us around trick or treating. They would have laughed us into the following year. NOBODY did that back then. Besides, what fun would that have been?
So between the trick or treating college kids and the other kids that were being bussed into our neighborhood, it just kind of disgusted me and I said that’s it, no more.
We decided to turn off our lights and keep our door closed. We thought that would suffice. After all, when were were kids, we never went to houses that didn’t have lights on, that was the rule. But that didn’t stop the kids around my way from ringing our bell and knocking on the door. So rather than sitting through the constant door bell ringing while trying to watch TV, we said the hell with it and decided to go out for dinner.
Our Halloween tradition these days consists of going out to dinner and perhaps a cocktail.
Gone are the days of making trays of goodie bags and going to costume parties and staying out till all hours of the night.
Tomorrow night, I will wear my black jacket and my rhinestone spider pin out to dinner. That is the extent of my costume these days. Although today I don’t have to wear my coat over it if I don’t want to. *snicker*
And to my Mom…
for all the years I put up such a fuss when I was a kid about wearing that hand me down gypsy skirt another year, I have to admit that the store bought princess costume that you reluctantly bought me was not nearly as grand as I imagined it would be. I guess mothers are always right.
Who would of thought that the gypsy skirt that I loathed so much as a child, would end up being my fondest memory of Halloween today. *smile*
A very safe and Happy Halloween to you all!
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