The end of a trick-or-treat era

“It doesn’t feel like Halloween.”

I kept repeating it, mournfully, throughout the afternoon and into the evening.

For the first time in 16 years, I would not be taking anyone trick-or-treating. One teenager was staying in, and the other teenager was heading to a party with friends.

They were both happy about their plans. Darling Husband was cheerfully answering the doorbell for the trick-or-treaters that started coming at 4:30 p.m. The dog teetered between being annoyed by all the disruption and pleased by the extra treats she scored.

And me? The mom?

I was just sad.

For so many years, we knew exactly what would happen on Halloween night.

A quick supper of frozen chicken nuggets and fries that everyone would pick at, too excited to eat much. A frantic search for the “good” trick-or-treating bags — very specific, tattered, oversized shopping bags.

A flurry of texts with the neighbours to decide exactly when we would all meet up to take our annual photo of the kids together before trick-or-treating along our own street. Excited squeals whenever the doorbell rang, as our kids fretted about the others “already out.”

Getting into costumes and putting on make up — sometimes even deciding on a different last-minute costume. (Like the year our son decided to ditch his store-bought costume to wear an old sheet and a hasty paper mask coloured on looseleaf.)

We had a route. We had a rhythm. I loved walking with the other parents, chatting at the bottom of driveways and calling out reminders to the kids. “Say thank you!” “Wait up! … WAIT UP!” (One of mine had a habit of bolting ahead of the rest.)

Some years, it was freezing and we wore gloves. Other years, it was crisp and cool as we crunched across the leaves together. One year, it poured so intensely that rain was streaming down my face, plastering my hair to my forehead.

We said hi to people we knew. We sometimes experimented by adding new streets onto our tried-and-tested route. We always made sure to hit “Bonus Street” — a special road we discovered that saw very few kids, so they always handed out huge treat bags. (To this day, I have no idea what the street is actually called.)

In the earlier years, I wore a Halloween costume. Then I discovered the fun of wearing Darling Husband’s high-vis jacket from work and carrying his light-up airport wands, and “directing traffic” by helping us cross the busier streets. Cars really did slow down when they saw me, and a passing police officer once gave me a little salute. I felt very important.

Our youngest was so treat-motivated that sometimes we would outlast the other kids. Fine with me, but my rule was that you had to carry your own bag, no matter how heavy it got. Sometimes she’d be hefting a bag that was so loaded down, I would have struggled to carry it.

After three solid hours of walking the neighhourbood, we were weary climbing the final hill of the route and getting back home. Then there was the excitement of seeing the “haul.” The kids took turns dumping out their bags on the kitchen table and spreading it out so we could all admire it.

Everything was checked, of course … for safety purposes. Darling Husband would ask for the old-fashioned Tootsie Pops and sticky molasses things wrapped in waxy paper, which the kids generously gave up in the glory of the moment.

Then … the trading! They would negotiate intense deals, like trading three very special suckers for five regular chocolate bars. We all sat around together, regaling Darling Husband with tales from our travels — who we saw along the road, and which houses were giving out the best stuff. He’d share his trick-or-treat tally — Sharpie tick-marks on a scrap of cardboard torn from a chip box.

Bedtime for the kids crept later over the years, but the night always ended with blowing out the pumpkins, shutting off the porch lights, and drawing the curtains to make it clear we were “closed.” Once the kids were in their rooms, Darling Husband and I would take a quick tour of their loot — making sure to remove anything that looked like it might be poisonous. (Strangers were always tampering with Reece peanut butter cups, it seems.)

Another Halloween in the books.

Another Halloween, just like all the others before it.

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This year, everything was different.

When the doorbell started ringing, there was no last-minute flurry of preparation for hitting the streets. Our daughter was upstairs getting ready for a party, and our son was upstairs online gaming with a friend.

The house was quiet except the hum of my sewing machine, where I was throwing myself into a project in an attempt to distract myself from The Sads.

Darling Husband tried to be sympathetic, but he didn’t really get it. “His” Halloween was exactly as it’s always been. For 16 years now, he’s made sure his days off or vacation lined up with the 31st. He doesn’t mind popping up every two seconds to answer the door — we usually get 160+ kids. He likes seeing the costumes, and chatting with the parents.

It’s his own little tradition, and it’s not going anywhere.

Unlike mine.

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So many things have been changing as our kids grow up, but most of the changes happen gradually.

They got more impatient with me taking photos and started balking at me posting on my socials, so it gradually moved into a rhythm where I’m only allowed to post select things each year — Christmas, birthdays, major events, etc.

They no longer wanted us to show up at every activity, so we scaled back to focus only on the things we’re still allowed to attend — dance recitals and competitions, taekwondo belt tests, rugby games, etc.

Instead of spending a whole Sunday picking pumpkins and doing fall activities (their activities and part-time jobs also made it impossible this year), we compromised by keeping our pumpkin-carving tradition.

I learned! I adjusted! I got used to each new normal.

Halloween, it seems, was a change that could not happen gradually. All the fun of the night was ripped away in a single painful yank. Taking my kids trick-or-treating was something I loved doing for 16 years, and I will never, ever do that again. Full stop.

Time seemed to go so slowly when they were little. I remember the early years with two toddlers, when we’d finish dinner and I’d lead then into the basement playroom for a change of scenery, just to get my exhausted body through until bedtime.

It felt like they could never be out of my sight, until they could.
It felt like they could never be left home alone, until they could.
It felt like they’d be little forever, until they weren’t.

“The days are long, but the years are short.” Gretchen Rubin

I was really sad last night, and I still feel sad this morning. This feels like a preview of the painful growing-up milestones coming down the road, as previewed by friends with children graduating high school. There are some things I do all the time that I’ll have to suddenly stop doing.

At some point, our son will have his last taekwondo belt test. Our daughter will dance in her last recital. (Seriously Heather, don’t do this to yourself or you will cry into your MacBook keys and wreck them.)

There are so many great things about having teenagers.

We can joke around together and have shared interests. They do well in school, even though I can’t really help either of them with homework anymore. They each have a part-time job, and take them very seriously. They participate in activities they love, and I get to watch they do what they love. They have great circles of friends, and some of their friends think I’m cool even though I’m an unc (RE: old). They are kind and funny and I genuinely love spending time with them.

In a few hours when our daughter wakes up, I’ll get to ask her about the Halloween party — who was there, and what everyone was wearing, if there was any drama. I’ll get to see the TikToks she filmed of her costume. She might tell me that people liked the costume I worked so hard to sew for her. If I’m good, she might even show me pictures and videos from her elusive private Snap story.

It’s a privilege to get to see your children grow up into awesome mini-adults. But it’s also sad to see parts of their childhood wrap up — dissolved into pictures and videos backed up in a cloud, beaming through your phone screen, looking impossibly small and cuddly in a way you can’t believe was once real life.

Their childhood is my childhood, too. Saying good-bye to trick-or-treating is more than just knowing I’ll never walk that same route, on that same night, with those same people. It’s saying good-bye to a season of life — a time when all that ever mattered was watching them climb endless porch steps, smiling proudly when they said ‘thank you,’ helping them cross the street, and getting them safely back home by 8:30.

These kids are the best book I’ve ever read, and I try to turn the pages softly as I finish each chapter.