What does Halloween look like nowadays? Every year people find elaborate costumes to go house to house with their friends racketeering people for candy. This custom is more prevalent with young children, who meet up to spend many hours past their bedtime getting a whole year’s worth of sugar in one night.
However, at a certain age we begin to see a drop off in the amount of people who participate in this fun tradition, instead turning to alternative ways to celebrate Halloween such as parties or haunted houses. This transition ultimately brings one question: Is trick-or-treating overrated or underrated?
Halloween is a holiday we received thanks to the Ancient Celts and their end of the year holiday called Samhain, when people would carve turnips to ward off evil spirits and dress up in scary costumes as a way to blend in with the spirits in an attempt to escape from their malicious tendencies. This was mixed with “Guisering” a tradition where people would go door to door singing songs, telling jokes and other tricks and were usually rewarded with something sweet. This eventually led to the world renowned holiday of Halloween.
But is it still worth it to trick or treat when you get older, especially when you begin high school, where the looks of others can sometimes make you feel as if it is necessary to act older and drop habits that might make you seem childish?
As you get older you begin to feel that trick-or-treating has lost its magic and the people around you start to move away from it, Instead preferring to hang out in groups and maybe go to Halloween parties. But in reality, going house to house and all those traditions, isn’t that where the true magic of Halloween lies?
While it may seem that treats and tricks are something you grow out of, this mindset is what makes Halloween lose some of its charm; its sense of community, imagination and mischief that taps into something deeper, even for adults.
First of all, it’s free candy, the one night of the year when you can go up to almost every house, knock on the door and receive candy and chocolate. But it is also a way for you to meet your neighbors and connect with your whole neighborhood. It is a holiday that is supposedly built around evil spirits and trickery but behind the face value, it is a fun holiday for all ages that connects a community and allows adults to feel nostalgia back from when they were kids.
Trick-or-treating has no age limit. This impression of stigma is simply because, instead of relishing in the fun and sweets of trick-or-treating, people seem to think that past a certain age costumes aren’t fun anymore. But I think that the real question is not whether trick-or-treating is overrated or underrated, but rather, what do you want to do to celebrate this holiday that has been around for centuries? Because after all, every single holiday or event is celebrated uniquely and matters to people for various reasons. This is why Halloween should be celebrated whatever way people would like it to be.
If trick-or-treating door to door is what someone wants to do, then they should be encouraged to. And who knows, if you tag along maybe all the free sugary treats will remind you why you loved this holiday so much when you were younger and you’ll realize there is no reason for you to stop loving it.