"Once again, the Hellmouth puts the special in special occasion."

Halloween is an appropriate time to bring out yet another Buffy quote, I think. I'm not sure Halloween means what it used to mean, and this makes me more than a little sad. Don't worry; I'm not going to go all "these kids today," probably, but I do have to wonder if I missed an update in our popular culture somewhere.

Halloween has always been sort of a neutral holiday to me. My folks were never the type to get down to their kids' level and roll around playing on the carpet. My sister and I were usually treated like little barely functioning adults (with no real choices, mind you). They never dressed up with my sister and I or even seemed to enjoy the trick-or-treating experience. My mom dutifully took my sister and I every year, but I don't think her heart was ever really in it. This, coupled with the fact that I grew up in Fundie-Fundamentalist-Wonderland where Halloween is often eyed with suspicion (like perhaps my $9.99 store-bought witch costume would somehow consume me. Until it actually happened to Buffy the Vampire Slayer years later, it wasn't even a possibility on my radar. Maybe Joss knows some Fundies.) means that I understand kids who look at the holiday as a candy gathering event. For me, it was a quick trip to a dozen or so houses and then on to town for a visit with the Joberts so the evening wouldn't totally blow for my Mom or theirs.

This was fine with me. Free candy was its own reward, and I enjoyed getting to stay up a little late and hang with a friend on a school night.

I've lived in a big city where people are panicky and frightened and convinced everyone is out to get them (that might actually be the tourism logo for Boston: Come to Boston and screw someone before they screw you, cause you know they want to!) for the past eight Halloweens, so we never got trick-or-treaters. When you never get trick-or-treaters, you buy the cool candy you like and pretend it's "just in case." This suited me all right, but this year I was excited to finally be in a place where ghosts and goblins come to the door with visions of chocolate dancing in their eyes. At first, I wasn't disappointed.

As the sun began to go down, the kids started showing up in waves. At first, it was as I expected -- downright adorable. No shockingly cute costumes, but then again I was always in a K-Mart pre-made myself, so I don't judge. The kids were very earnest and quite cute. They were ecstatic that I had actual chocolate (I HATE people who cheap out on Halloween candy and don't splurge for real stuff -- especially since most of those people have children and should give what they expect to get). Their parents were wonderful too. These were mostly children I don't know but do recognize as they are the ones who play with Boogie on our walks. Even my partner in crime, not a fan of children on the whole and flat on his back from a backyard-work-pulled-muscle injury a few days ago, was charmed.

He warned me it wouldn't last, and he was right. Something happened at about 8 o'clock.

"Scary" Halloween costumes got replaced by truly scary events. Around eight, the kids got older and the costumes disappeared. "Trick-or-treat" stopped and I opened the door to find teenagers without costumes shoving pillow cases at me with grunts or no sound at all.

The hell?

This is when I realized that a cute fun holiday tradition I remember fondly had turned into extortion. See, I'm not naive nor was I a traditionally "good" child throughout my adolescence. I work with late stage adolescents and young adults every day. I know what they think, and I think I remember what they are going through. I was probably almost as mad at the world as the grunters on my front porch. Still, I wondered as they shoved their greedy hands into what was left of my candy and grabbed handfuls despite my cheery offer for them to take only two because I was running low and it didn't look like the night was ending any time soon.

I found myself a little nervous. Part of me wanted to rail on these kids with their vaguely threatening looks and their friends not old enough to be out alone but far too old to be trick or treating hanging out in the bushes. Then again, maybe it's because I don't have children of my own, but I don't feel like a grown-up, and I really hate acting like one. When you don't have the future of the world on your shoulders, as you do when you have kids, you don't really ever have to act like an adult, and I choose not to, most of the time. I actually didn't say anything to the kids, because, in the midst of my quandry, I could almost see the outlines of their egg cartons. Few things I'm sure about, but one is that egg does not come easily out of vinyl siding, especially when the person in charge of the outside of the house is partially crippled in pain on the couch.

All at once I stopped being mad or frustrated at the Boston attitude. I understood. Halloween has stopped being a neat way for neighbors to get to know each other and give each other's children a special treat. It's no longer a way to celebrate the future generations of a community.

It's a payoff to a pimply, vaguely obese teenage mafia.

And I am powerless to stop it. What can I do? Times are tough and children are desperate. Candy is expensive, and they just gotta have it.

I did what any responsible, intelligent adult would do. I loaded up my tattered boyfriend, turned off the lights, and took him out for a beer.

I'll worry about the vinyl siding tomorrow.