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| Bon-Bons of the Vanities Revealing the Tricks of the Trick-or-Treat Trade. |
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FDR once said "We have nothing to fear but fear itself'' (an idea which, I don't know about you, but I find pretty damn scary), so I guess having one day a year to exorcise all our personal demons by parading them out in public sort of makes sense. But even with all the ghouls, ghosts, goblins, and other assorted nasties that wander the streets on All Hallows Eve, I must confess I've never found Halloween that scary. Opening the door on Halloween night to find a pint-sized Frankenstein on my doorstep isn't what sends shivers up my spine. No, I find myself frightened by other things--say, the idea of yet another Rocky sequel or the possibility of an Archies reunion. Flying scares me, too. There's just something that causes me to tense up when the stewardess suggests that some part of the aircraft can be used as a flotation device. And insomnia frightens me. True, I don't have insomnia, but the very idea that I might get it keeps me up at night. Some of my fears are of the more exotic variety. For example, I find myself haunted by the possibility that I am a superstar in a sport that hasn't been invented yet. After all, if Karl Malone were born a hundred years ago he'd be just a really tall guy. How do I know that, except for bad timing, I might not be the Mark McGwire of snarkleball or the Tiger Woods of gammagolf? That I might have the perfect slinkshot or be able to hit a yorb-in-one? This scares me, but I guess it's not exactly the type of thing you could base a Halloween costume on. But I suppose everybody has their own personal fears. I'm sure Shaquille O'Neal has nightmares about missing that game-winning free throw. William Bennett tosses and turns anticipating the next Marilyn Manson album. And Jerry Falwell is frightened by things that go bump-and-grind in the night. But the fright factor has never been what's appealed to me about Halloween. For me Halloween has always been about one thing: trick-or-treating. When I was growing up, the name of the game was candy, and the success or failure of a Halloween night out was measured in sackfuls. For my buddies and me, trick-or-treating was serious business. When the big night rolled around, we would meet at the old, abandoned McClusky house--an appropriately spooky location--and, almost conspiratorially, formulate strategies and plot routes to ensure a maximum candy haul. We knew from experience which houses yielded the best stuff--which were good for Mr. Goodbars and which were Milk Dud duds. And we wouldn't just trick-or-treat in our own neighborhoods, but would venture into surrounding ones, as well. I even had one friend named Zack who, with his big brother's help, would start out really early in the evening and trick-or-treat regionally, covering the city's greater metropolitan area with all the determination of a door-to-door salesman. Zack was sort of the Willy Loman of Goo-Goo Clusters. Not until the last house on the block had extinguished its lights and not until we had goaded that last bite-sized Butterfinger bar from that little old lady would we throw in the towel. Then, and only then, would we head home, dragging our sacks full of treats. And for weeks after Halloween, the economy at our school would convert to the Milky Way standard. Kids would gather during recess to participate in the high-powered world of candy swapping. The action was fast and furious, with ten-year-olds negotiating with the intensity of commodities brokers on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade. It wasn't unusual to see Joey Spinoli, waving his arms frantically with his face red as a beet, desperately trying to unload some Slo-Poke futures. Post-Halloween candy-swapping was probably where young Mikey Milken got his first taste of high finance, although I'm not exactly sure what the confectionary equivalent of insider trading would be unless it was knowing whether the center of a particular piece of candy was chewy or creamy. I suppose the experience did have some educational value. Trading Halloween candy was our first exposure to such economic concepts as "supply and demand" which, in this case, meant that if all you had to trade were those little "candy corn" things you were pretty much dead in the water. Oh well. Enough musing about Halloween. The leaves are starting to turn, there's a nip in the air, and the pumpkins are getting ripe, so I better stop now and get to work on my costume. Let's see. How about Tom Green as an airline pilot. Now that's a scary thought. Photoillustration by Barry Willis |
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