I’m not one to dress up for Halloween. I haven’t in over two decades. But I do enjoy seeing children giddy with all of the sugary goodness they collect in their baskets. Even in my teenage years, my favorite part of Halloween was sitting on the porch and interacting with all of the children who came by our house to get candy. As my house was in one of those neighborhoods where people came from miles around to get the best candy, there were always a lot of children. I also grew up in a small town so I knew most of them.

With the exception of a single year back in the house where I grew up when I was clerking, I’ve lived in dorms or apartments for about fifteen years now. But that changed a few months ago when I moved into a house. And this is a house in a leafy but still fairly dense area of cul-de-sacs. There are also plenty of children, both in the larger neighborhood and in my smaller section. So this was the first year I bought candy to have in order to be ready to give out.

Overall, it just didn’t happen. Sure I didn’t decorate the exterior the way some houses in the neighborhood did, but I had the light on and parked my car in such a way to make it easier to get to the door. I only had about four groups during the evening and a total of six children, one of whom was way too old to be trick-or-treating but was also alone so I just let that go without comment. Now I have most of a bag of skittles and starburst that I will try to pawn off on people during group meetings, but that is less of an issue than the tinge of loss I felt. I had hoped that this Halloween would be more like those from my youth, but it wasn’t to be.