If Your Teenager Shows Up At My Door to Trick-or-Treat, Here’s What I’ll Do

There has never been a time in my life where I didn't love Halloween. From a small child, I always loved everything about the season. I relished in the autumnal walks my mother would take me on to our local 5 & 10 store, where it was appropriately decked out in witch window clings, stuffed black cats, and pumpkins galore. I loved picking out a costume each year, and I especially loved trick-or-treating.

I'll never forget the last year I went. I was 12 and was allowed to go out with a group of friends unsupervised in the neighborhood that night.

I remember feeling so damn cool and so happy. I met a lot of new kids that night, and we had a great time — that was until I overheard a boy say "Man, I'm really going to miss this next year."

"What do you mean? Are you moving?" I asked him, unsure of what he meant.

"Cause it's the last year we can do this! We can't be trick-or-treating like little kids next year. People think it's weird." And everyone around him seemed to fervently agree. 

And the truth is he was kind of right.

There are so many people who put an age limit on this autumnal past time -- so much so there are even laws in areas against teens trick-or-treating.

Yes. For real. Kids under than 16 in some areas will be fined upward of $200 if they're even just seen hanging around on Halloween in the neighborhood with a mask on. 

And I've heard SO many people complain about it too. 

"I won't give out candy to bigger kids. It's just weird."

"What are they doing? Don't they have better things to be doing like trying to get a date?"

The people who complain about these kids are the same ones who moan teenagers don't act their age.

Is there a candy shortage I'm not aware of? Is there an epidemic of teenagers brutally beating little ones on Halloween night to get to neighborhood doors? 

In a world where teenagers are inundated with pressures to look, think, and act "cool" at all times, what is the harm in letting them hold on to a little bit of the silly and strange?

So if your teenage kids show up at my door and scream trick-or-treat in the hopes of getting candy ...

… I'm going to give them two pieces. Because seriously, why not let kids be kids for as long as they can? They have a world of bills and work and debt waiting for them — why not let them hold on to a night where magic feels real and it's cool to be a little weird?

Now if they show up without a costume, that's a different story.