I have such wonderful memories of Halloween when I was a child, back in 1492…
It was before the world changed. Back when I was free to walk by myself half a mile to my friend’s house to play for the day. Back when we actually Trick-or-Treated, dressed up in handmade costumes and going out at night with a group of friends – no parents – to spend a couple of hours gathering as many goodies as possible before we wound our way back home, half sick from eating our ‘spoils.’ :0)
I never wore a costume bought from a store. One of my favorite memories was figuring out what I ‘would go as” (meaning what type of person or character I would emulate) and then figuring out how I could make a costume. My friends did the same.
I lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma on one of two streets that ran parallel to each other and were one mile long, called Johannson Acres. Each house sat on an acre and a quarter. Some of my friends had horses, though I never learned to ride.
My friends would meet on Halloween evening and walk to the neighborhood behind us, where the houses were closer together with lots and lots of porch lights on, welcoming us. My favorite treat was a mini-chocolate bar, like Snickers. A close second was anything baked by a wonderful mom.
We would come home laden with goodies, legs tired from all of the walking, grinning from ear to ear, full of stories about our adventures. I was shocked one year to hear that we needed to cut apples in half before eating to make sure there weren’t any razor blades hidden in them – the first memory that the world as I knew it was changing.
Since we now live on top of a ridge line, up a steep driving outside the town, we don’t get any trick-or-treaters. Churches have get-togethers for the kids, or create scary houses for kids and their parents to tour. If you go to town during the festivities, you might see a small group of children, but they are closely followed by a mom in a vehicle. Everyone seems to be in a costume bought from the store. Kids are taught to wait to eat any goodies so that parents can go through everything, throwing out anything baked, or anything that might be suspect before the children get their goodies back.
My ‘celebration’ of Halloween nowadays is search the Net to find the absolutely fantastic job people do on pumpkins and decorations. I am in awe of the creativity and talent shown and will share what I find with you. I’ll also look for children’s costumes that I find clever and creative.
creativeartworksblog 