Halloween Must Be Coming

I confess that I like Halloween. I like the pumpkins, falling leaves, witches, ghosts, goblins and little kids dressed in costumes. Unfortunately, much of the hoopla that is Halloween has ended in my neighborhood. Twenty years ago, we had an active group of parents and kids in the 3-10 year-old range and we had some excellent celebrations. One or more neighbors would host a Halloween party for the kids and twenty to thirty costumed little ones would show up. We had neighborhood parades, dunking for apples, spooky “houses” and everything else.

All those little ones have grown and gone. They, the little ones, are either on their own or simply moved out of the area and couples with no youngsters have moved in. Last year we had only about a dozen kids show up to Trick-or-Treat. Just a few homes on the block have little kids and their houses are pretty easy to spot as they also have the yard decorations for all the holidays. (They also have the bicycles, toys, etc. the rest of the year.)