The Halloween Way Back Machine

You know you have reached certain maturity when

a. you find yourself reminiscing wistfully often about things and moments from your past,

and

b. noting how different your response to holidays is now, compared to when you were an impressionable fresh faced kid.

If only I could relive those excited feelings experienced on Halloween Eve back when I was a child!

Like the first day of school and Christmas, this day found me with butterflies in my stomach and tingling with anticipation. And it wasn't just the candy I knew I would be accumulating in my bag--it was the thrill of being out in the dark neighborhood, kicking through the piles of the dry fallen leaves underfoot, trying hard to see through my mask(and usually my upper lip sweating underneath it). It was the belief that, yes, maybe a witch or werewolf was hiding behind a tree. My imagination ran wild and half expected something to jump out at me at any time.

One of the earliest Halloweens I can remember was the year I was five years old which is when the photo above was taken.

Maine, Halloween 1967.

Halloween must have fallen on a Saturday one of those years(back then, growing up in Maine, everyone ate Boston Baked Beans on a Saturday for supper) because I vividly remember having to try eating a supper of Baked Beans -with brown bread, the kind that came out of the can, of course. Or else this was just an easy meal for my mother to put on the table on that night.

But, with an already churning stomach and being so keyed up for Halloween, can you imagine trying to eat something heavy like beans in a thick molasses sauce?? I could barely get two forkfuls down, and then my mother finally let my sister and I leave the table to go and get into our costumes.

Early on, my sister(that's her in the clown mask)and I always wore those boxed ready-made costumes (Ben Cooper) you found just before Halloween in the "dime" stores(my father actually ran one at the time), and I only vaguely remember the princess costume I am wearing in the photo. They were pretty cheap and cheesy--a plastic mask you secured around your head with this thin elastic strap, and some kind of jump suit or cape to go with it-often a popular cartoon character. A year or so later after my Princess costume Halloween, I do remember getting a Penelope Pitstop costume. And my sister had a tiger costume that she wore for years, too. It wasn't until we were older that we got into creative, homemade costumes.

Accompanied, probably, by my mother(although it wasn't long before it was always only my sister and I, because parents weren't afraid for their children being out alone like they are now) we went door-to-door in our neighborhood, getting our bags filled with Clark Bars, Pixie Stix, Sugar Daddys, Charms Pops, Bubblegum Cigars, Oh Henry bars, Chuckles, Tootsie Rolls, Bit O Honey(always hated those, though), bubble gum card packs (one year I was frightened by a Planet Of The Apes card pack!) and of course, candy corn. There was always someone who thought they were being the healthy treat giver and handed out those miniature boxes of Sun Maid raisins. Those always remained at the very bottom of my bag and were one of the last things to be eaten. And really, those sticky raisins were just as bad for the teeth as any candy, right?
Often, since I remember Halloween nights being cold, we were invited in by strangers, to have hot chocolate or homemade cookies or popcorn balls in their kitchen, too.

I live in a neighborhood now, where trick-or-treating is a pretty big event(we go through bag after bag of candy because we get so many children coming to our door), so I guess I can only try to remember now how absolutely exciting it was for me, and view Halloween as more of a spectator event now. That's the wistful part.