R-E-S-P-E-C-T

I am not going to hand out religious tracts. I am not going to say "Jesus Loves You" as your child leaves my house. I am not going to have a great big pumpkin with John 3:16 carved on it. I respect and accept your decision to participate in Halloween. I do not, however, appreciate how it gets shoved down my throat.

Today Kidlet is home. He is not in school because there will be costume clad children running about. I think it's hypocritical that if he was to dress up as a young Jesus and I was to dress up as an older Mary, we would be forcing our religious beliefs on other people, yet its okay for my child to be exposed to Wiccan and Satanism in school. Yes, some kids will be going as a witch and some as a Devil or Satan.

In 2002 I "did" Halloween. I spent almost four hours decorating my yard. Having already read Erma Bombeck's "The Grass Is Always Greener Over The Septic Tank" I knew that living in suburbia meant lots of trick or treaters. I also know enough about humour writing to recognize exaggeration for comedic value. I split the difference and bought enough for 75 children. It turned out to be a good call, although as the night went on, there was less "thank you", more "gimme" and some flat out greed. Face it, if someone comes walking up with their costume clad 4 month old, no other children in sight; it doesn't take a genius to figure out who the candy is for. It does, however, take guts to be sixteen years old and dress up as a trio of cheerleaders. Their counterparts arrived a few minutes later, with a trio of sixteen year old girls dressed up as football players. They were the last three trick or treaters. Big Lug had a meeting he didn't want to miss, which meant I had to hand out the treats myself.

In 2003 I decided based on my experience of last year, I wasn't going to do Halloween. Fifteen month Kidlet was sick and Big Lug wasn't just across the city, he was out of the country. In my day it was simple. You turn off your front porch light, didn't put out a pumpkin and no worries. I soon discovered things had changed since my day. People didn't care about the porch light out, the undecorated front yard; all they cared about was candy. In 2004 the good news was Big Lug was home. The bad news was that both Big Lug and Kidlet were sick with the flu. Based on my experience from last year, I had to go out, put a barrier across our front door steps and hope for the best. I could have done without hearing F bombs, the S word and CRAP as people ignored the undecorated yard, the porch light off and even going to the extreme of closing the curtains. From 2005-2007 we left the house. Since Kidlet was being homeschooled in 2007, we didn't have to make the decision of whether or not to have him stay home on Halloween.

Today in our household, it's Adventure Day. Kidlet will be staying home from school. Tonight we'll have a quiet evening at home. The only difference is we won't be able to look at the night sky through the bay window. Thanks to greed and obsession, we'll have to close the curtains.

Proverbs 31:27a: She looks well to the ways of her household