Halloween

I guess you would call the place I grew up a subdivision. It called itself the Village of Marchwood. It was a suburban housing development. It was pretty nice though. There were a lot of trees and sidewalks for just about every street. The sidewalks are crucial to a successful Halloween, at least for smaller kids. Very few residents opted out of Halloween by turning off their porch lights and generally giving off a stay away vibe. Being in your house to give out candy on Halloween seemed like civic duty. There was definitely none of the car-based trick-or-treating that you have now, where you have to drive a long way between houses just to find one with the lights on. Occasionally parents would drive kids to another neighborhood entirely and let them loose at the entrance. In Marchwood my dad and and Christal's dad would alternate years taking us when we were very small. Then we went with older kids, then by ourselves. I remember one year I was staying with my friend Megan in Westtown and we trick-or-treated in her neighborhood. We were eleven or so, so we went by ourselves.