Twick or Tweat
It is that time of year….of course every time is a specific time of year, but, in this case, I am referring to that season of orange—-of orange leaves drifting down and draping the lawns, orange ovals cut into jack-o-lanterns, and orange-and-black caped mini-goblins going door-to-door on the last day of this month. Of course, stores started preparing for this time of year back in August, showcasing monster masks and costumes of the latest super heroes or tv personalities or political caricatures. The child in all of us comes out at various times and in various seasons.
Growing up in the Bronx, Halloween for me consisted of trick or treating all six floors of our small apartment building on Burnside Avenue, perhaps seventeen apartments in all. Half the apartments did not answer my knock. I trudged up and down the darkened stairs, a small hobgoblin trick-or-treating in cold shadows that haunted the hallways. In the city, a parent does not send a trick-or-treater up and down urban blocks soliciting goodies. The whole event took me maybe twenty minutes.
When we moved to suburban New Jersey, my parents sent me out the door on Halloween and were surprised if I came back within three hours. The town of Ridgefield was open to hundreds of costumed devils and witches and ghosts and zombies of all mishapes and sizes. Houses were festooned with orange lights and cobwebs and lawn witches and pumpkins. And the haul! Clark bars and Musketeers and Fifth Avenues and Good and Plenty and Mars bars and Almond Joys. The tonnage of sweet stuff took at least a week to devour. Sure, there was the occasional health food giver who tossed in an apple, and there were those home owners who chimed in with some pennies which we disdained—until, like Homer Simpson, we realized that currency could be exchanged for candy. My younger brother Jimmy and I divvied up the loot, his favorites Chuckles and Hershey’s Kisses and mine, Bonomo’s Turkish Taffy. As the older and wiser brother, I calculated that one Chuckles was worth two Turkish Taffies were. The negotiation process took several hours.
My fond memories of Halloween were added to when I became a parent of a trick-or-treater. For her first Halloween, Christie, my oldest, dressed up as a witch. We practiced her approach. “Knock on the door.” She rapped the kitchen table twice. “Say ‘Trick or Treat.’” “Twick or tweat.” “And if they ask you what you are, say, ‘Cackle, Cackle, I’m a witch.’” “Cackle, cackle, I’m a witch.”
So we tried it out on our next door neighbor. Christie knocked on the door, our neighbor opened the door, Christie sang out, “Twick or Tweat,” our neighbor asked what she was (it was obvious, but adults always have difficulty initiating conversations with toddlers), and Christie responded, “Cackle! Cackle! I’m a witch!” Our neighbor plopped a handful of Jolly Ranchers into Christie’s plastic pumpkin basket. Christie looked at the candy in the bottom of her orange bucket, looked back at our neighbor and back at the candy. I took her by the hand to the next house where the routine was repeated and she studied the growing mound of candy in her pumpkin basket. Connections were being made. Somehow this witch behavior was wielding rewards.
At the third house Christie walked up to the door, knocked loudly, the door opened, and she said, “Twick or Tweat, I’m a witch, Cackle Cackle, where’s the candy?” I had to remind her of the proper trick-or-treating protocol. Kids learn fast when they have an investment in the learning…..so do we all.
One of my favorite Halloweens as a parental escort occurred on an unusually bitter cold night, the wind blowing hard and an occasional spit of rain slashing at the faces of me and my two oldest, Christie and Becky. They were so bundled up by their mother that the costumes hardly showed, but they seemed warm and eager. The alternative to having our kids stay warm was to have them go as ghosts, spreading a sheet over the fifty pounds of sweaters and overcoats they were wearing. I had on a light jacket, and after the first block of houses I was hoping that the trick-or-treating would be a short affair. By the second block, my nose was running, and I was imagining that I might become the first parental hypothermia victim. As we turned the second corner and I took in with dread the number of houses we were going to visit, I met the father of two trick-or-treaters who were friends of my daughters. The trick-or-treaters joined forces, and we became a team. At the end of one side of the block, with the wind picking up, my parental compatriot voiced the same emotion I had.
“Boy, tonight is brutal. Worse Halloween for weather ever!” The spitting rain was becoming freezing rain and it stung our faces.
I nodded. I think my lips were frozen together.
A few freezing seconds went by. He reached in his pocket.
“Glad I brought this.”
It was a gun-metal flask.
“Brandy. Want a hit?”
I nodded and forced my lips apart.
The liquid went down smoothly.
We trick or treated the other side of the street when my daughters stopped and examined their father who had frost on his eyebrows. “Want to go home, daddy?” I shook my head and we continued. And my adult mon ami and I continued our ritual….which repeated itself at more frequent intervals. By the end of the fifth block, our trick-or-treaters’ little legs were giving out. “Maybe we should go home now,” Christie said.
“No, no. Look at all those houses on the next block,” I advised. The flask was almost—almost– empty, and the cold was not so cold and the rain may or may not have stopped. It was a very small flask, not enough to fog the brain of one grown man, let alone two. The sips just provided a glow, making the weather seem more like a stroll through a Virginian garden in May rather than a staggering through ice floes in January.
When we did finally return home, Polley studied my face for some reason. “I didn’t think you guys would stay out so long.”
I just smiled. “They were having such a good time.” I will forever remember and be in perpetual debt to that fellow father of trick-or-treaters who got me through that Halloween. Christie and Becky certainly seemed ecstatic with their cache.
Halloween has changed. Apparently, kids can’t dress as “evil beings.” No more witches, devils, skeletons, zombies, or Putins. We have now kids sporting tv personalities and celebrities. In my day that would have meant masks of Wally Cox and Dorothy Kilgallen or anyone else occupying the center square in Hollywood Squares or on What’s My Line? And candy has been replaced with gift cards and donations to charitable enterprises, and boo-bubbles and monster bracelets. Is one boo-bubble equal to two monster bracelets? We also have the Teal Pumpkin Project which raises food allergies awareness for children (like my grandchildren) who have to be careful about what they digest.
Old Fogey Alert: It just seems to me that like most things Halloween has become more complicated. More fear about what might happen and less joy in what is happening. Perhaps that has always been the reality. Rose colored glasses and all that. When the dust clears from my brain I realize my foolishness. In reality the children of today will know (and hopefully enjoy) Halloween as it is…..boo-bubbles, teal pumpkins and all.
I do believe that for many children, Halloween is their favorite holiday…even more than Hanukah or Christmas or Kwanza. And that is because kids can wear masks, meaning they do not have to behave like the goodie-two shoes adults are expecting them to be all the time. For a few hours they can stagger like zombies or display their muscles for truth and justice as superheroes or they can cackle like witches, or become a walking mailbox. We all wear masks at times (another future blog entry), but on Halloween young ones can pretend to be someone else…and this pretense is licensed. At this one time of year we are allowed to be scary and scared at the same time. Boo!!