About 1/2 A Bubble Off

For many, many, many years, Halloween was the holiday for me. I looked forward to it all year long. I liked it more than Christmas! Every year I went shopping right after Halloween to find the perfect (discounted) decorations for the following year and man, did I have a lot.

The very first day of October you could find me in my yard putting up decorations. I "dug" graves, I had spiders and skeletons, I had a full sized coffin and more. 

Some years, I'd dress up in a costume and position myself inside of the coffin just waiting to scare the bejeezus out of poor unsuspecting kids. Other years, I'd make a long dark tunnel out of my front porch and I'd dress up in a creepy costume, sitting stock still in a chair with the candy bowl in my lap. As the kids approached me, I'd stare at them while wearing creepy yellow contact lenses, just daring them to reach for a piece of candy. When they did, I'd barely move  which would really freak them out. 

I had dozens of costumes to choose from, too. Here are a few of my favorite looks:

Halloween was the Holy Grail for me. It didn't matter that my kids got older and outgrew trick or treating. I still liked to dress up and wander around. I was a kid that refused to grow up (still am).

Last year I began to notice a change. I didn't drag out as many decorations and I didn't go shopping for more props. I did dress up and go trick or treating but it didn't seem to be as much fun. 

This year I only put out one decoration. My casket is still stored in the garage. I didn't bring out the bats and rats and bloody body parts and I didn't even open up my costume container. I'm wondering what in the heck-fire has happened to me. Where has my spirit gone??? 

Where I work, we go all out decorating and the children of the employees are invited to come to the office and go trick or treating. It's a HUGE deal but I didn't get involved. And when the kids showed up, I high-tailed it to an unused office and hid from all of the wonderfully wild mayhem.

Um, excuse me but, I think I'm turning into a scrooge or something! It's alarming! As of this writing, I've got 2 days to ramp up my Halloweenism. I don't know if I can pull it off but I'm sure going to try because there are tons of little kids out there that need to see that you never outgrow Halloween. Plus, they're fun to prank. Maybe I'll go crazy and dress up in one piece from each of my costumes. I'll be a conglomerate the likes of which no one has ever seen. That's if I can catch the spirit in the big way like I've done in past years. I sure hope I do. Otherwise I'll be a dull old humbugger.