Halloween Discussion Forums, Costumes, Horror!

Another odd topic that some of you may find interesting to think about: That weird and wonderful atmosphere that happened (or used to happen?) a little while after it got dark on Halloween night. A lot of this was in my mind I am sure. But some of it surely was created by the hordes of little goblins running around causing mischief. It seemed to me that, oh, after it had been dark for about an hour, the neighborhood transformed into a different place entirely...I mean, it was the same place, technically, but I guess it looked weird because none of us kids were accustomed to running around at night; we were usually indoors by dark.

I remember trick or treating with my folks at first, and then later, when I got a little older and could run around without falling down too often, they sent me out with my school chums.

Once, in the late 70's, oh, I musta been pretty old by then, we even went and checked out another neighborhood entirely, and that was neat because we really didn't know anyone and the houses all looked weird. Only did that once though. Usually it was strictly in one's own neighborhood.

One year I had this really scary green mask. You should have seen this thing, it was a horrible monster face, real creepy. I was out with the school chums and at some point decided to break away from them and just run around the neighborhood, howling and making dog noises and so on. I actually hid behind some bushes and jumped out and scared some folks! That was pretty wacky. I ran and caught up with the school chums and we continued with the treating. I seem to remember that year there was a weird kind of vampire blood sold that was basically red vaseline...maybe you remember this stuff. It wasn't liquid at all, it was literally petroleum jelly with red coloring in it, and so you sort of smeared it on and it looked kind of strange. Not as good as the liquid stuff but interesting.

A Dracula makeup was darn easy back then. You could take some baby powder and water and smear it on your face and let it dry, or you could go the expensive route and get some greasepaint crayons and whiten your face that way. Borrow Mom's eyebrow pencil and draw a widow's peak on your forehead...a little red blood dripping and some dime store vampire fangs and you had it...the 10-minute vampire. Not everyone could get a black cape together and I remember a lot of vampires wearing white sheet capes because it was easier!

I guess what really transformed the neighborhood was really everyone's enthusiasm sort of charging the air! Fun to run around in that stuff.

Feel free to list your own examples!

NICE MEMORIES. HALLOWEEN NIGHT ALWAYS HAS A SPECIAL THRILL ABOUT IT. YOU CAN SMELL IT, FEEL IT AND SEE IT. I ALWAYS TAKE A LAST PEEK OUTDOORS JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT ON HALLOWEEN, TO GET ONE LAST GLIMPSE OF THAT SPECIAL EVENING.

I remember that Vampire blood. It was total <deleted>. That was back before the general public knew about Karo syrup and red food coloring . . .

As kid, I certainly seem to remember trick-or-treating until 10 or 11pm. The last batch a kids a had this year was around 8pm. Sad. Halloween's looked forward to all year, then it peaks and ends in about 2 hours.

Ray Bradbury, I feel, does an excellent job of capturing that Hallloween night spirit in his quintessential Halloween book, "The Halloween Tree." See my avatar.