Last night as Big Daddy trotted around the neighborhood with the kiddos ... begging, collecting and devouring candy treats, I stayed home and handed out candy to the little boogers that showed up on my doorstep.
With every treat I dropped into Halloween bags, I came to realize the following things:
1. Kids today are not like the kids of yesterday. Too lazy to keep an official count, I am guesstimating that only 30% of children even muttered the simple words 'Trick or Treat'. HELLO? Ya gotta SAY it or I'm not giving your this chocolate bar. I'm not. We can sit here all damn day ... my kids aren't here and I've got nothin' but time on my hands.
2. I would estimate that maybe 2 children said 'thank you' without their parents telling them to. One of those being my own daughter. What the heck? I have to admit though, it was a proud moment.
3. When I was growing up, we were thrilled with 1 teenie weenie piece of whatever in the hell the person wanted to bestow upon us. Today, the greed factor is unbelievable. At our house we hand out full sized candy bars. Yes, we strive to be the coolest on the block, it's not working though. Anyway, as I handed some children their giant bar they actually complained that it wasn't the one they wanted. One kid even groaned that he only got one, when he walked away. I know I was standing there with my mouth wide open. And I'm sure that was a beautiful sight.
4. I realized that I don't clean our windows nearly as often as I should. With eight little grubby hands, two pet noses and a giant dog tongue ... they could stand to be windexed twice daily ... but that ain't happenin'. I'll vacuum every day, but I'm not a window washer. Needless to say, every time the bell rang, I was embarrassed of the prints and smears decorating my front door. Not embarrassed enough to wash it though.
5. The most important thing I realized though is that I wouldn't trade my four brats for any other brats around. I was proud of them last night. Proud of their manners. Proud of their attitudes. Proud of their love and excitement for a fun filled evening.
With that, I shut off our porch light and we snuggled in for some candy ... and anticipated the egg shells we'd step on and the yolks that would fall into our hair when the garage door opened, as we left for school this morning.
I hope you all had a spooktacular Halloween.