Sunday, October 31, 2010

All Hallowed-Out

I realize that, these days, saying that I'm not a fan of Hallowe'en is kind of like saying I don't like fuzzy kittens. But, honestly, I just don't care for Hallowe'en.

Disregarding any childhood issues with masks and trick-or-treating in costumes with parkas over them, the issues I've got with Hallowe'en these days are pretty much all recent.

Okay. Sure. I'm not a fan of being scared. I don't enjoy the creepy crawly stuff. I don't much care for the undead or their ilk. (Although there are movies that I love which do include most of those things.)

But I'm also not a fan of people using any excuse to drink too much or be overly crazy and over-the-top -- not just on Hallowe'en, but any time of the year. (See also my not wanting to go out to get drunk with my officemates for Happy Hour.)

And while I understand that people like to get out of themselves for a night, I've seldom really enjoyed that, myself. Maybe it's just been a really long time since I've been around the right group of people who make we want to expose myself. Or maybe I'm phenomenally boring at heart.

Oh, and I'm also not one of those people who feels that "Hallowe'en is a gay man's Christmas." You know why? Because Christmas is my Christmas. And, no, I've never really understood the comparison, either.

And then there are moments like tonight. Tonight, after Christopher and I had been gone for three nights, we got home and had no Hallowe'en candy around. We hadn't expected to be home when there were trick-or-treaters out, so we simply hadn't gone to that expense (especially since the last time we did try to be prepared, there were only about 3 kids who showed up, and we ended up with 2 bags of leftover candy). Not wanting to mislead any kids, we kept our front light off and closed the drapes. Nevertheless, we had some kids come to the door early on. They rang the doorbell, which of course freaked out the dog. As I tried to calm her, the kids then pounded on the door (really - not just knocking - but pounding). At which point there was basically no way in Hall...owe'en that I would have opened the door, even if I HAD had candy.

But don't get me wrong - I enjoy seeing pictures of other people's Hallowe'en fun. And I love hearing about what my nephews and niece are up to. I just don't want to be forced to participate.

Don't worry, I still like kittens. And bunnies and puppies, too.

1 comment:

Robin said...

Rude Kids! They don't deserve candy...
We had around 150 kids last night - and an amazing number of them (most) said Thank You after getting candy (even the "almost too big to trick-or-treat" crowd was polite).