GUEST COLUMN | Tom Purcell
Not until it got dark!
That was the trick or treating rule my mother set down every year. She didn’t want me to embarrass her by interrupting families still having dinner.
I hated the rule. Tommy Gillen and I had big plans to hit as many houses as possible before we had to come home.
It was the 1970s, after all. Schools weren’t yet banning Halloween activities. There was no kid obesity epidemic. There weren’t many modern sensitivities at all.
And so I dressed as a hobo, a Depression-era fellow with dirt on his face carrying a stick over his shoulder. That is considered insensitive today.
We didn’t care about our costumes much anyhow. All we cared about was the candy, kids’ gold. Candy and junk food were hardly ever permitted in our home the rest of the year.
And our Halloween mission was to pack as much of it into a pillowcase as we could.
Despite urban legends about candy laced with poison or needles, parents allowed their 10-year-old kids to roam the streets, banging on front doors miles away from home.
Tommy and I refined our plan every year.
We’d start with the bigger houses on the other side of the tunnel, where the “rich” people handed out full-size, name-brand treats.
They gave us Hershey’s, Nestle Crunch, Milk Duds, Good & Plenty, Almond Joy, $100,000 Bar, Twizzlers, Snickers, Milky Way, Kit Kat, M&M’s, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup and the granddaddy of them all, the Mallow Cup.
We knew which houses to hit and which to avoid. There was always some little old lady who handed out popcorn balls or Rice Crispy marshmallow bars.
Hey, lady, we’d think, our mothers can make those for us at home! Go to the store and get some real candy next year!
After miles of walking, we’d hit the small ranch houses in the adjoining borough. The people there were nice but, boy, did they grate on a kid’s nerves.
Many handed out nickel candy — one fifth the size of a regular bar. We had to hit five houses to equal one lousy bar.
Or, worse, they handed out Clark Bars, a crunchy peanut bar that was made locally in Pittsburgh and, therefore, cheap. The only thing I hated more than a Clark Bar was a Zagnut, which was a Clark Bar covered with toenail clippings.
Tommy and I would keep going until it was well beyond our 8:30 p.m. deadline. We never arrived home until after 10 p.m., our feet raw.
After getting lectured for embarrassing our mothers by knocking on people’s doors so late, we locked ourselves in our bedrooms to take inventory of our considerable stash.
What a thrill to dump a full pillowcase of candy onto the carpet, organize it by category and bask in our newfound wealth. Of course, that wonderful feeling was soon overcome by the fear that our siblings would find where we’d hide it — so we’d spit on it!
Alas, that is how Halloween was for millions of baby boom kids in the ‘70s.
We learned to navigate dark alleys and busy roads. We learned to avoid mean dogs. We learned to outwit older kids who roamed the streets taking candy from younger kids.
I don’t eat candy often, but when I enjoy a Baby Ruth, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup or Kit Kat now, the taste transports me instantly back to 1972, when I was a 10-year-old kid working like mad to fill my pillowcase with junk food my parents would never spend their hardearned money on at the store.
Copyright 2024 Tom Purcell, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.
See Tom Purcell’s syndicated column, humor books and funny videos featuring his dog, Thurber, at TomPurcell. com. Email him at [email protected].
