Halloween has always been my favorite time of the year. I love candy!
When I was younger I'd go trick or treating with several of the neighborhood kids. We'd hit every house on our road - about 4 blocks long - then we'd branch out further. I'd often return home with a full pillowcase of goodies that I could barely carry.
Of course the favorite house on the block was the lady who made caramel apples. Some sneaky tricksters went back to her house a few times. And the popcorn balls wrapped in cellophane. Yummy! And the little chocolate bars back in those days were a decent size, about half the size of a regular chocolate bar. Not the little one or two bite chocolates that are sold these days.
And then a townhouse complex was built in 1970. A new thing for the area. This is the 12th towhouse registered with British Columbia. Now the legal descriptions for new condos are numbered in the thousands. 86 units on 5 acres. A bunch of houses to hit in one small area. We all flocked there. Kids from out of town were driven in by their parents. It was a zoo. And sadly by the time we came to many houses they were all out of candy. That townhouse quickly changed its policy for subsequent Halloweens and had all the trick or treaters come to the workshed where a sack of candies is handed out.
I dressed up in many of the traditional costumes associated with Halloween - a ghost, a clown, a witch. I'll never forget that witch outfit. It was pouring rain that night. I was wearing a pointed black witch's hat with crepe paper fringe around the bottom. The rain washed it out in no time and I had black dye running down my face. A truly gruesome looking witch.
One year my parents took my sack of candies away from me so I wouldn't eat it all. And sadly I never saw it again. My parents forgot where they put it. Or so they claimed. Maybe they ate it all.
Now as a homeowner I hand out goodies each Halloween. I have a box of 75 mini chocolate bars and a box of 63 small bags of potato chips. Well those were the starting numbers. Kerry has gotten into both of them. Last year we had between 50 and 60 kids. Tomorrow night the weather forecast is for rain so I expect the number of trick or treaters to be lower. The good thing about the rain is it deters the troublemakers.
And so I'll wait tomorrow night with my handouts, watching the kids slog through the rain, and memories of that witch's hat and the black dye running down my face has been in my head all day.
Happy Halloween!
