Does anybody drive their kids to different (better?) neighborhoods to do their trick-or-treating?
In my old neighborhood, we had tons of kids walk in from the nearby lower-class neighborhoods because it was safer. I think that’s what’s going on in my new neighborhood, too. My neighborhood is distinctly working-class but a step up from some of the surrounding areas. I lived only a few miles west of here and got no one for years. Last night we had at least 60 kids and would have had more if we hadn’t left around 8PM. So are kids actually getting ruder or am I just old? Some of those kids were downright nasty – asking for money, sneering at my candy offerings.
San Fernando Valley in CA here, and carloads of kids regularly pull up to our street on halloween, because we’re a great pocket of single family homes and lots of the homeowners here put on a great show for the kids (like the guy who plays quiet, spooky music through speakers until the kids walk past them, then he jumps on a microphone and goes BOOOO!
Our trick or treat time suck now, 6-7 is all they get. Our town is weird, pockets of middle class surrounded by the filthy rich, with neighborhoods of extreme poverty distributed between them. There’s one ritzy subdivision near us that’s very well known for giving out whole candy bars and dollar bills, and lots of people who don’t live there take their kids there. We just had this very same conversation yesterday, as one of my employees and her family took about 8 kids there.
I’m a divorced, partial-custody dad who lives in a non-trick-or-treat-friendly neighborhood. We take my daughter to Boo at the Zoo every year–it’s usually the weekend before Halloween, so my daughter then gets to do the actual trick-or-treating in her mom’s neighborhood, too. On Halloween, my wife and I walk over to a nearby fancier neighborhood and join in the fun there. There are some folks there who throw a party every year, with a table outside for candy distribution. There are definitely kids who come in from other areas; everyone expects and plans for that. It’s all part of the fun for us.
