Honestly, I could do what every other person does. I can go to the grocery store and by those “fun size” bagfuls of candies, sit by my door, and wait for the costumed little trick-or-treaters to arrive and shout ‘TRICK OR TREAT” and then I hand off the candies. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Not this year.
I’m skipping the Halloween festivities. As far as I’m concerned, go next door and get the Snickers and the Hershey bars from my neighbor.
Look, I get it. Halloween is a fun holiday. It’s when everybody can dress up in costume and celebrate the fun of being a witch or a monster or a vampire, if for only one night. It’s when people purchase those 16-foot-tall skeletons for the front lawn, trying to outdo their neighbor who put up a 15-foot-tall skeleton last year.
I’m just … not interested this time around.
And don’t give me this “Oh, Chuck, just get into the spirit of things, it’ll be fun” mantra.
Why? Why should I even bother?
First off, let’s start with the door-to-door thing. Roving bands of kids going door to door and begging for candies. And heaven forbid you run out of sweets – that next band of trick-or-treaters will fling eggs at your car and toss toilet paper rolls into your trees. I don’t have time for that.
And I’m also sick of hearing the fear-mongering that someone might hand out what are alleged to be candies laced with fentanyl. Seriously? What happened, they ran out of razor blades for apples and needles in the Twinkies? Besides, we all know that when the candy haul comes back home, Mom and Dad will pick out the good treats and leave the kids with the old stale candies. You know, the “Trick or Treat Tax.” Hey, maybe they scooped up the rainbow fentanyl for themselves, you don’t know.
And the costumes. Do the children pick the costumes, or do the parents pick the costumes and force them upon the children? I mean, it’s one thing to dress up as a Marvel superhero or some character from Stranger Things, but what if mom and dad think you’d look oh so adorable wearing a Donald Trump costume? Don’t laugh at me, there are plenty of photos of kids in black business suits with over-long red ties and an orange pompadour wig. I just don’t feel like linking to those photos and adding to the clickbait.
Here’s the thing. If I want to celebrate Halloween, I can simply watch a double-feature of It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown and follow it with The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and I’m set.
I don’t need to dress up as a werewolf to celebrate the holidays. I’m good. I’m fine.
At this point, Halloween is just a holiday to help the candy companies stay in business. It’s the holiday where vacant stores turn into Spirit outlets. It’s the holiday where people go into the craft store and start snarling the moment they see Christmas decorations, snarling, “It’s not even Halloween yet!”
It is official. I am now the old man who shouts at kids to get off his lawn. 😀
I’m good. Trust me on this. Halloween is for the kids. Let them have the fun.
The world is already scary enough.
Chuck The Writer 
I gave up on it years ago – no kids out here in the hinterlands. But I always have a supply of quarters on hand, should a stray munchkin come knocking.
I anxiously await your treatment of Christmas.
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Living in downtown, the only kids that came by were the children of friends of my parents, and when they grew out of trick or treating, that was it. Haven’t had anybody at the crib in years. Today’s parents play it safe, and only take the kiddo’s to familiar places, like my friends did;
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I live very close to an elementary school. We get about 200 people/per year (except during COVID). It’s fun for me. And I’ve already bought the candy. You made a case for you not doing it, and that’s fine.
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Halloween has long been the most commercially corrupted ‘holiday’, even exceeding Christmas. This year many people will be rethinking it, if only due to the obscene greedflation costs.
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I am skipping this year too! I just feel like the past few years have been evil and creepy enough. I am not into horror – this year I need an extra long Christmas to reignite my soul.
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