My son’s jack-o-lantern from last year.
Christians have a funny relationship with Halloween. Some are dead set against it. “It is the devil’s holiday and I will spend it watching reruns of Highway to Heaven and Touched By An Angel.” Some are all in. “I’ve been planning my costume for six months and I’ve spent three hundred dollars to look like Thor. I even contacted a costume department in LA to get some tips.” A lot of people are in the middle. “Yeah, so, I’ve gotta get the kids dressed up to go trick or treating. They’ll get a bunch of candy, then I’ll go through it after they go to bed and pull out all the Sweet Tarts and Butterfingers.” I find myself squarely in the last group. This makes for awkward conversations with the first group.
Them: Hey, what are you guys doing this week?
Me: Well, Monday is Halloween, so I guess we’re going trick-or-treating.
Them: (Judgemental pause 1,2,3,4,5………) Doesn’t it make you a little uncomfortable, you know, because of the origins of the holiday?
Me: Nah. I’m not sacrificing goats, I’m just dressing the kids up like Obi Wan Kenobi and The Karate Kid so they can get some candy.
Them: (Another judgmental pause)
Me: (Just an awkward pause) Well,,,, I guess we’ll see you next week.
It’s okay. I understand people who don’t want to participate. To each their own. We can all live in harmony. Who we can’t live in harmony with is the person who spends three hundred dollars on a costume, that’s just nuts.
Every year when I take the kids trick-or-treating we inevitably come the house where people hand out apples, or small bags of pretzels, or, GASP, a toothbrush. Look folks, I know that handing out apples may make you feel really good about yourself, but at my house they will not get eaten. We have principles. Trick-or-treating is not about you feeling good about the things you hand out. It’s about my kids collecting candy that we otherwise wouldn’t have in the house. (Again, Sweet Tarts and Butterfingers are much appreciated.) The clue is in the word “treat.” Pretzel people. No. Stop doing that. The kids are looking for treats, they are not on a Southwest Airlines flight to Denver. Pretzels are a last ditch snack. When you’ve consumed all the good stuff in the pantry, there is always one lonely bag of pretzels left saying, “Please eat me.” Last but not least, toothbrush guy. We get it, you’re a dentist. All that we ask is that you stop looking at Halloween as the enemy of teeth and start looking at it as job security.
I know I’m two weeks early for a Halloween post. Sorry about that, but I just wanted to give the people above a chance to make things right by running out to pick up a couple of those mixed bags of Hershey’s miniatures. That way, they can avoid my wife and I egging their houses.
Happy Halloween. ?
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