Halloween is a big deal in our house. Or, as I discovered this year, it used to be.
I was never stumped about what to buy for my son’s birthday in late September. At the top of his list would be somewhat useless things, such as fake live wires that hiss and shake, or pricey licensed products, including a replica proton pack from the Ghostbusters franchise.
He loved to visit the local Spirit Halloween store and pick out his gifts for under a certain amount of cash. It was great to see his face light up when he reached the animatronics section, stamped on the touch pads, and recoiled as a giant spider or demented nun jumped out.
But not this year.
My son didn’t want to go into the Halloween store
This fall, a week before his 15th birthday, I literally had to drag him out of the car when we parked up. He wanted to stay inside to play on his iPhone, a tactic he pulls whenever we try to take him for a short hike.
His dad confiscated his devices, and he reluctantly entered the store. It was a treasure trove of killer clowns, decapitated pigs’ heads, and Harry Potter merchandise. My son showed about as much interest as a rap fan at a country music festival.
He rallied for a while, looking in the mirror at himself in a Jason Voorhees mask from Friday the 13th. Then he decided on Michael Myers and rushed to the checkout as if he couldn’t wait to get out.
I once made a 160-mile round trip to pick up an animatronic purchased on eBay
In 2024, he spent 90 minutes choosing between the scary, sleeping scarecrow and a one-armed zombie called Rick Ratman, who had rodents coming out of his head. He opted for the latter, which he proudly positioned on the stoop.
He joined a haunted, moving tree that I’d bought on eBay — it involved a 160-mile round trip to the seller’s home in a neighboring state— and a giant, talking triffid from Home Depot.
It’s a tradition to install a new animatronic ahead of every October 31. Kids from the neighborhood ride past on their bikes to admire it. Some have been known to photograph or video it, and that’s why I bought a 6ft screeching night owl statue on special offer last month.
I told everyone that October 5th was Halloween decorating day. It was one of the highlights of the year, second only to putting up our Christmas stuff.
My teenage daughter said, ‘Less is more, Mom’
As time passes, my 17-year-old daughter has become less hands-on than her younger brother. But she still got a kick out of draping black lace fabric around our lampshades for that sinister Victorian seance look.
This year, she didn’t even want to do that. She said that our decorations were tasteless and tacky. “Less is more, Mom,” she scoffed before bolting to Starbucks with her friends.
It wasn’t too long ago that she’d sit at the kitchen table making “mummy lanterns” from Mason jars, gauze bandages, fairy lights, and googly eyes. She’d excitedly bake headless gingerbread men and splatter them with blood-red icing.
Excuse the horror pun, but it was my son who stuck the proverbial knife in my heart. I dragged in the boxes of decorations from the garage. He sat on the sofa playing Nintendo without looking up from the switch.
I asked if he wanted to help twist the bendy spiders’ legs around the staircase. “You do it, Mom,” he said. This was a stark contrast to when he was younger, and it was a ritual we enjoyed together.
“Shall we assemble the owl?” I asked. He shook his head. Eventually, I forced him into the front yard to hold the ladder while I hung up two corpses in cocoons.
It wasn’t the same as previous years
It wasn’t much fun putting up the decorations by myself. I missed the banter, the laughter, and camaraderie of family. Our au pair and his friend came to the rescue by building the new animatronic and zip-tying the skeleton to the swing on our tree.
But it wasn’t quite the same. I know that many children become more distant toward their parents as they grow up. But as I stuck another AA battery into a groaning plastic chandelier, I felt sad that I was losing my kids — or had already lost them —over time.
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