“Trick-or-treat!” Kids’ cheers echo through the streets of every neighborhood as the sun goes down on Halloween night. Kids go house to house in costumes ranging from superheroes to princesses, expecting king-size candy bars.
NICOLE KAFFEE: I’ve trick-or-treated in the Fox Hills West/Copenhaver neighborhood since I moved there on my second birthday. Some years in huge groups, others alone with my sister, I could always be found racing from house to house to acquire my long-awaited Milky Ways. As I got older, trick or treating became more of a joke to me, a funny tradition friends and I would do to keep the spirit alive. This year, Janna and I decided to turn the fun, competitive tradition experimental.
JANNA FRANK: Trick-or-treating in elementary school consisted of decorated houses, parents sitting in costume on their porches and kids’ enthusiastic screams. As a high schooler who no longer gets excited to dress up or thinks about knocking on doors for candy, I can recognize spirit is dropping, with more house lights turned off than on. Performing this experiment was a way to dive into how the spirit around Halloween is trending.
I obviously hope the spirit of Halloween doesn’t disappear as we get older, but it’s hard to decipher if it will, as I predict the night to be filled with people, but the streets to be less crowded than in previous years. Some houses will welcome the holiday, complementing our costumes and offering candy. Other houses might seem annoyed with endlessly answering the door to give candy to teenagers who have aged out of trick-or-treating. I was looking forward to Nicole and I going undercover.
NK: Last year, I went trick-or-treating in a different neighborhood with friends out of boredom. No one treated us any differently, still giving us multiple king-size bars and the night ended with a stuffed pillowcase. I expect the same from my neighborhood this year. I know the majority of my neighbors and can’t imagine any of them turning us down or making any snarky comments about our age, but we’ll see.
We suited up in frog and leopard onesies, starting our journey on Lamp Post Lane nice and early, for a high schooler, at 6:45 p.m. sharp.
JF: Nicole and I went to 15 different houses to trick-or-treat and test out our theory: At what age is trick or treating looked at as childish and can we still manage to have fun? When we left Nicole’s house, the streets were empty. I had little hope of seeing the fun decorations and costumes I had previously felt nostalgic about. However, once we entered the main road in her neighborhood, there were more trick-or-treaters and spirited houses, but yet not nearly as many as previous years.
NK: I wasn’t surprised that my cul-de-sac had no decorations as we barely get any trick-or-treaters. Walking toward my neighborhood’s main street, Falls Chapel Way, the shock started to settle in on how few trick-or-treaters there really were. The first house’s “take one” bowl was already empty. Not even before we reached our third house, we received our first “How old are you guys?”
JF: At each house we visited, it was evident how people felt about me and Nicole trick-or-treating as teenagers, based on their eye contact and choice of language when talking to us. One of the early houses exemplified this, as Nicole and I ran up to the house ready for candy behind a big group of kids. It definitely didn’t help because we looked incredibly old compared to them. Once the children were done collecting their candy and it was our turn to go up, the woman started talking to us about the kids and how they needed a supervisor to watch them. She was sweet, the rhetoric she used mirrored a conversation she would have with her adult friends.
NK: By the time we made it into Copenhaver, the streets started to fill like they used to. Janna and I trailed behind large groups of kids, which, unlike before, helped to blend us in. The usual houses were decked with decor, but still, more and more bowls were out and more lights were off than I remember from my childhood.
JF: I have trick-or-treated in Copenhaver before, and it was different, especially with the houses just putting out candy bowls and calling it a night. Nicole and I look forward to handing out candy and decorating our homes when we are older so the lack of local spirit is sad to see. Also, most of the houses that had the candy bowls outside were empty so Nicole and I couldn’t even enjoy more candy.
NK: By 7:30 p.m., we headed home. If I were to tell the elementary school me that I went trick or treating, but for less than an hour, she would’ve laughed at me. Surprisingly, we ended up with heavy bags for the duration we were out. I think that since the number of trick-or-treaters has decreased, the amount each house gives has increased. The number of king-sized candy bars I received would’ve sent that elementary school me into orbit: two.
JF: I hate to admit it, but by the time 7:30 rolled around, I was pretty tired.. I brought a small bag and, surprisingly, it was almost full with the two king-sized candy bars, which is pretty disappointing as I usually get at least four king sizes.
NK: I can’t say that I didn’t expect trick or treating to lose some of its hype, but not nearly this much of it. The loss of bright decorations and warm greetings at the door definitely added a hint of sadness to this whole experiment. Seeing the emptiness highlighted how lucky I was to have had those years of racing to houses to secure my favorite candy. Even if younger kids nowadays aren’t spending their Halloween night trick-or-treating through their neighborhood, I hope they still grow to love the absolute fun that comes with this fall holiday.
JF: Trick-or-treating as a high schooler made my inner child still feel cherished. However, trick-or-treating did not feel the same as it did years ago and it became apparent that the holiday that I look forward to every year does not spark excitement for everyone anymore. This experiment gave me a little hope that kids still dress up and houses are still decorated, no matter how few people care.
