Halloween

For the past couple of years, Henry has been a tough customer at Halloween. Two years ago he was the sulkiest, grumpiest pumpkin you've ever seen. I remember saying to Michael, if a kid can't be happy on Halloween...?!?!? But Henry is just different. He doesn't like dressing up, being in the spotlight or doing what other people do. Last year he said he was going to be Superman, and although I waited until the last minute to start making his costume, he still balked and changed his mind. In the end, he put on his pirate bandanna and eyepatch-- which he wore all the time and often slept in-- and went trick-or-treating in that. Now, you might think, fine; what's the big deal? But Michael and I decided that this year we were going to explain the tradition of Halloween to him and expect him to honor it-- put on a real costume if he wanted to go trick-or-treating, or if he didn't want to dress up, fine-- hand out candy with us. But it was not okay to go around the neighborhood collecting candy without a proper costume. So, a couple of weeks ago, he decided to be Darth Vader. I waited. This week, I told him he needed to decide for certain by bedtime on Wednesday, because Thursday we'd go shopping for materials and start making the costume. He held firm on Darth Vader. Thursday, on the way to the store, he announced that he'd changed his mind to Obi-Wan Kenobi. I was annoyed, but accepted it-- after all, that's an easier costume to make! We got an excellent light saber and went home, and he started waffling about the different elements of the costume. This morning before school I tried to drape the hood/cape on him, and he started to get very upset. Today was trick-or-treating, mind you-- Lancaster sometimes decrees that it will be held on a different day from October 31. It deteriorated from there, and he was lobbying intensely for just carrying a light saber, but we held firm: either a real costume, or no trick-or-treating. He chose the no trick-or-treating-- no costume, no candy.

He was clearly troubled by the difficult choice, but once he made it he seemed to feel pretty good about it. We went to a little event at the college before trick-or-treating where we carved pumpkins, and he did a great job and enjoyed himself; he also liked spotting the trick-or-treaters coming down the sidewalk, climbing around on the porches, and generally being a bit on the outskirts of the community hubbub. He really did censor himself on the candy; we gather with all our neighbors on one porch and hand out all our candy together, so there were six or eight baskets there, but he just took one piece from time to time. It broke my heart a little bit when, as we tucked him into bed, he was reciting exactly which 8 treats he had had all evening, including a cookie at the pumpkin-carving and one fun-size Hershey bar that he had opened, noticed its divisions into three squares, and counted as 3 separate treats ("I'm going to eat one square each day, Mom, and then after three days I'll eat my last treat that I'm saving.").

Although I feel good about how we handled it this year as parents, I was saddened by the whole thing. I felt like Henry was holding himself back from having fun, from dressing up and running around like a superhero--denying himself fun almost like an anorexic denies herself food. Why? Michael was much more sanguine about it all. We should celebrate his difference, not lament it, Michael says-- he was respectful of the tradition but still went his own way, did what he wanted. I guess the key point is Henry's happiness-- if he really was happy with how things turned out, then great. My worry is that he really *wanted* to trick-or-treat but somehow couldn't make himself do it. Most likely, I'm overthinking the whole thing. Lucky for me, Agatha is still too young to have complex emotional struggles; though she's certainly getting more assertive and toddleresque, she's basically an open, enthusiastic participator. There's no doubt that she had a great Halloween!