I always enjoyed creating my Halloween costume growing up. One year, I was Blue Elvis (because I couldn't find a white sequined sweatsuit); the next year, I made my debut as a chicken in a rather large, overstuffed, incredibly hot costume (it was so hot that I nearly passed out); another year, I decided to be Stitch (of Lilo and Stitch fame) and an astronaut all at once. However, all good things must come to an end; per my mother's instruction, my fun ended when I was in the fifth or sixth grade. No more Cleopatra costumes for me; my new Halloween pastime became handing out candy to other little ghouls and goblins that ventured down my long, never-ending driveway in hopes of a treat.
As a twelve-year-old, I wasn't keen on missing out on the fun of candy and costumes while my classmates talked excitedly about their Halloween plans. At the time, it seemed as though I was the only one whose mother had said I was too old to go out trick-or-treating. However, I quickly got over my disappointment when it came time to carve pumpkins--it also helped that I could raid our candy bowl whenever I wanted since I was the one in charge of it. I didn't want to admit it at the time, but by the time our candy bowl was empty that first year of handing out treats, I realized my mother was right; at some point, enough is enough.
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I can't say if twelve years old was that point; I think that point varies a bit for everyone. However, I do think someone is too old to be trick or treating when the voice at my door is deep enough to be mistaken for my father's and the beard on their face is long enough for me to think they must surely be dressing as a young Santa Claus. If their costume appears more appropriate for Hooter's than Halloween, they might be just a bit too old to be hitting the streets and soliciting candy.
The spirit of Halloween, especially trick-or-treating, is largely geared to younger children. The fun in dressing up and going house to house, neighborhood to neighborhood, to fill hollow plastic pumpkins with candy belongs to youngsters, not teenagers wearing promiscuous, gory, or frightening masks and roving the streets for candy simply because no one has told them they can't. Of course, teenagers can still enjoy the holiday--dressing up and candy hunting fun does not have an attached age limit--but I find that the older Halloween participants grow, the darker the holiday becomes.
It isn't lines of children waiting outside massive haunted houses with names like The Edge of Hell, it's teenagers and adults. It isn't six-year-olds wearing bloody Grim Reaper costumes, it's older teens. It isn't eight-year-olds putting up gory decorations that scare away younger, eager trick-or-treaters, it's adolescents. It isn't cute little Tigger lookalikes on the front porch that make me want to slam my door and withhold my candy; it's those my age wearing nothing but disgusting or creepy costumes that make me shudder and grow stingy with the Skittles.
Children, on the other hand, seem to enjoy Halloween in its purest form--a night to be whoever or whatever they want to be and score massive amounts of candy at the same time, all while the adults in the houses they visit ooh and ahh over them. Children don't care for all the horror that comes with older participants in Halloween. They simply want to have a good time. For some children, myself included--sensitive child that I was during my trick-or-treating days--seeing other kids, giants who are so much older than they and in such bizarre, eerie costumes can be a deterrent and a fun-spoiler; no child wants to be truly frightened on Halloween.
Halloween parties exist for those of us too old to hit the streets. Teenagers can certainly get their inner ghoul on at any number of ghastly get-togethers held on Halloween rather than hitting the streets in those creepy costumes. As a college student, my campus is hosting "Treat the Suites" on Halloween in an effort to keep students safe and off the streets--and yes, college is definitely too old to be stealing candy from children via trick-or-treating!
I'm a believer in the logic that if the point of puberty has been reached, stay off the streets on Halloween. I can't speak for everyone, but I know I don't want to open my door to find someone old enough to be my husband on my doorstep asking for candy when I expected a five-year-old in a Spider-Man suit. There is classiness in knowing when to quit (or take it off the streets and head to costume parties).
