Trick or Treating
I read a statistic that only 28% of kids went traditional trick-or-treating, e.g., door-to-door. And in some places, it was much lower than 28%.
The trend now is to go truck-or-treating, where people set up in parking lots, and kids go car-to-car, collecting candy. It didn’t exist when my kids were little, though it makes a lot of sense to keep small children in an enclosed area without cars moving through. For other kids, it is less overwhelming than walking around in the dark or going up to stranger’s houses. It’s a solution to a trick-or-treating problem.
But it’s also a little bittersweet to think of the trick-or-treating from my childhood going away as fewer and fewer people do it each year.
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My neighborhood is filled with trick or treaters every year. We live in a small town with a mix of neighborhoods without sidewalks or streetlights, dirt roads with spread out houses and no streetlights, and my neighborhood – sidewalks, houses a reasonable distance apart, and lots of people and light. So people come from surrounding neighborhoods and we love it. My kids see all their friends and have the fun of lots of groups out and about, and we get to stay home and not drive anywhere. I hand out candy and then watch them come home and haggle with friends for more of their faves. However this year I noticed that a lot of people set up in their driveways, with fire pits or tables with food and beverages, making it a hangout. I was in my house waiting for the doorbell and knocks only to see a lot of kids walk on by. I guess walking up to my door was too much? My lights were on! Eventually I went out on my porch but I wasn’t thrilled about it. Overall though, I’m still glad we have the trick or treat neighborhood.
My dad’s apartment complex has trunk-or-treat to keep kids from having to be buzzed in to buildings, and to make it easier for residents who want to participate vs DON’T want to participate.
We had our FIRST trick-or-treater since moving here, which is our first trick-or-treater in over 5 years since an unfortunate (crime-scene-tape-festooned) situation shut down trick-or-treating at our old house the last Halloween we were there. It was very exciting! We may have scared her with our exuberance though.
I love traditional trick-or-treat. I was glad to see that most of my students went out to trick-or-treat, in their neighborhood or a safer one.
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