Halloween used to be a social contract. Even homes with no kids would hand out treats, in EVERY neighborhood. It was one day a year when everyone had to put pants and the porch light on and participate. A chance to get to know your own neighbors.
If you didn't, the other part of the social contract was that kids might toilet paper your yard or egg your house...it simply wasn't worth taking the chance of not handing out treats. After all, it's only once a year.
That was the social contract of Halloween when I was a kid.
Even the guy with no lawn, just potatoes in his front yard...the Bermuda yard where if, during the rest of the year, your ball or frisbee was considered lost forever if it went in there because no one, and I mean NO ONE DARED GO IN THAT YARD.
Even he opened his gate, turned on the light and handed out candy. Halloween wasn't a pagan celebration, it was a time when the whole community got together and had a light hearted, boo-fully scary good time.
Imagine the potential for neighborhood improvement if parents and kids were to, en masse, take back their own neighborhoods.
That is, for the parents that care.
