Soap Opera

Outside our neighbor's house. c1952

"Bar of soap?"

"Check."

"Can of shaving cream?"

"Check."

"Dozen eggs?"

"Check."

Fifty years ago, that was what we took along with us on Halloween after we had passed the age of reasonable trick or treating. Around the age of thirteen you still wanted to go get all that free candy, but it just wasn't cool anymore to traipse around in a corny costume on Halloween. So we gave up the candy for the thrill of giving adults indigestion and grief. Nothing we did, none of the vandalism, caused any permanent damage. Soap on the windows, sometimes dirty words written in that soap, simply washed off. Same with the shaving cream. True, dried on egg was a little more difficult, but still not permanent. I think the worst thing I ever did was to turn a hose on and stick it up into an enclosed porch. Yes, I was a little asshole when I reached a certain age.

The other day I asked one of the neighbors if kids on our street went door to door trick or treating. "Oh yes. Not just our street, but the whole neighborhood." I thought about that for a minute. Back in Florida nobody, not one soul, not one single child, ever rang our doorbell or knocked on the door on Halloween. Yet every year Mark would buy bags of Halloween candy, and I would sit around eating that shit until my gut felt like it would explode. It was possibly part of Mark's devious plan to fatten me up so that no other man would look at me. So I am kind of looking forward to seeing all the kids coming up to our door on Monday. They'll be doing their part to help me keep in shape. Both by making me go up and down the stairs to let them in, and by eating all of Mark's candy. What I hope doesn't happen is for some little asshole like me to show up with some eggs, soap, and shaving cream.