NEWS

I am the parent of a former trick-or-treater, so I know young children would rather have a pillowcase full of candy on Halloween than toys at Christmas. When I lived in Charlotte, the street on which I lived, Biltmore Drive, was known for its proliferation of children. In fact, it was a joke around town that if you’re trying to conceive, then moving to the street almost guarantees conception before you’ve unpacked the first box of bric-a-brac.

For the past 65 years or more, the street has hosted a large Halloween Parade that includes costumed children from newborns to teens. The city issues a permit each year to block off the street with bright orange traffic cones and saw horses to contain the 200-plus crowd that includes residents, former residents, and children who flock to this historic, annual event. Following a block-long parade, costumes are judged by the street’s impartial empty nesters, while swarms of little witches, mummies, and bumble bees nibble away on candy corn, popcorn, pizza, and hot dogs.

Each year, Halloween decorations became more and more elaborate and went up earlier and earlier. Halloween decorations, now a cottage and expensive industry, got scarier and scarier each year, as well. By early October, house after house seemed to up the ante and quantity of their decorations from the year before. Admittedly, when my son was young, we  joined the creative Halloween tradition. One Halloween, we put a dummy dressed in farm clothes on the front steps. Then, on Halloween night, my husband insisted he don the dummy’s clothes and assume the position on the front steps. When the first children came within a few feet of our front door, he would spring to life as tiny trick-or-treaters came to retrieve candy. Unfortunately, I was not paying attention when the first recipients of this prank involved two-year-old, twin girls dressed in pink ballerina outfits. Upon seeing this “dummy” come to life, the toddlers dropped their bright orange plastic pumpkins full of candy and ran screaming for their parents who waited on the sidewalk for their little princesses. The dirty looks my husband received for upsetting their children was a true Halloween nightmare.

While I love to see children get a sugar fix, what I don’t understand are the over-the-top decorations. One year my neighbors, parents of three, had a full-sized mannequin in their front yard with an ax coming out of his head. Another had a display of tombstones with grizzly fake hands reaching out from graves. It’s no wonder baby boomers fear death a little. These afterlife displays aren’t exactly reassuring.

What I also don’t understand is that on other days of the year, parents pride themselves on monitoring and controlling the violence their kids are exposed to on television and online. But on Halloween, it seems all bets are off. Now toddlers fresh out of diapers witness all sorts of ghoulish scenes. There are skeletons 20 feet high in the air and frightening monsters competing with the roof lines of many homes.

Now to me, some of these scary displays are like allowing young children to watch Dateline or even Beetlejuice. Personally, I’d like to see some of these scarier Halloween “decorations” toned down – at least the really gory ones that involve oozing brains and amputated limbs. A simple white pillowcase tied up to look like a ghost feels about right to me, or the fake spider webs that some people stretch across their boxwoods. I’ve even come to accept the over-the-top inflatable pumpkins and bright orange electric lights that could signal to Pluto during an apocalypse. But these concerns are coming from someone who grew up watching “Casper The Friendly Ghost,” a beloved little spirit who couldn’t muster up enough courage to say “boo” to anyone.

Despite what seems like the new norm for frightening decorations, I have to admit I’ve never heard of a parent who had to take their child to a psychiatrist for post-traumatic Halloween therapy. Maybe kids are too distracted by the accumulated effects of sugar to pay much attention to the 20–foot skeleton reaching for them complete with scary sound effects. Let’s hope so.

After my son grew out of Halloween, I stopped carving a real pumpkin and bought a ceramic one I keep on a shelf in the attic. I will continue to sit in a stadium chair in front of my townhouse this Halloween, while distributing candy to those children who start their house-to-house candy campaign at 5 p.m. Maybe this year I’ll try to eat enough candy so I can focus more on my sugar high then on the full-sized floating head hanging on the front door of my neighbor’s house.

(Editors Note: Welcome Jean Spangler to The Written Word! We are so excited that you answered our call for writers and know that our readers will look forward to your contributions, as do we.)