01 November 2006

Post-Halloween Musings

I don't quite get the people who huff and puff about adults enjoying Halloween (with grown-up parties and costumes) on the grounds that it's a children's holiday (and a subtext that the adults should bloody well grow up and do something adult, like, I dunno, sitting in their basement grousing about trick-or-treaters). I was never under the impression that enjoying costumes and parties was necessarily limited to those under 12. Of course, I don't think enjoying fantasy in general is necessarily a sign of immaturity, either, though I know there are masses of people who would disagree with me.

A little tired of people whining about trick-or-treaters, too. They're kids, it's one night a year, if you don't want to play, leave your porch light off or go out. I heard someone today grousing 'They started at 5 o'clock in my neighbourhood this year! Can you believe that?'

Er, well, yes. At 5 it's still light, and for small children, their parents may prefer taking them out earlier, so they can have their fun and still have dinner and go to bed on time. The unspoken rule in my neighbourhood is trick-or-treating between 6-8 pm, but I don't think there would be an uproar if the littler kids came out a bit earlier.

I do agree that there's a point at which you are too old to go trick-or-treating, and that age comes sometime between 12 and 14, but speaking generally the kids themselves come to that conclusion too, and if a group of 15-year-olds showed up on my doorstep and were in costumes, I don't think I'd deny them a lollipop because they were too old.

The less said about trick-or-treating at malls the better. The random high-school kid who works at the Gap is somehow safer and more trustworthy than your neighbours? Or is this a way to get out of actually having to supervise your offspring?

The less said about so-called 'hell house ministries' the better, too. Headline News was airing a lot of crud about those last night. I changed the channel. First off, theologically these people are from Mars. The gospel message, as I remember it, was about love and forgiveness and peace, not bigotry and fear. Secondly, the more attention you give them, the more it looks like they're actually legitimate or in some way meaningful, instead of the religious lunatic fringe they are.

Best moment of the trick-or-treating last night: an approximately 3-year-old dragon standing on my front walk, looking up expectantly at the bowl of candy in my hand.

'What do you say, Gavin?' coached Mommy from the street.

'Um, thank you!' said Gavin the dragon, holding out his pillowcase.

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