It's that time of year again-- the leaves are all turning into various shades of yellow and orange, the air has a nice, cold tinge to it and it's begun to get a little spooky everywhere you go. Buildings are being adorned with ghosts, ghouls and skeletons and porches are decorated with jack-o-lanterns that have scary faces and landscape. This is the beautiful time of year that coincides with Halloween, the spookiest holiday ever.
One of the most important aspects of Halloween is the costumes that people wear the night of the festivities. Each costume tells a story, whether they are trying to let everybody know what their favorite section of popular culture is to what their favorite animal is and anything in between. Sometimes these costumes are designed to be funny and lighthearted, and sometimes these costumes are dark and scary. Whatever the case, many people put a lot of time and thought into their costumes that they are only going to wear for a few hours one night of the year, and these people deserve to get loads of compliments and recognition for their hard work.
Another big aspect of Halloween is the candy. Most people, regardless of age, love the candy that accompanies the holiday. When kids go out and trick-or-treat by going up to doors and asking for candy, it is one of the biggest rushes to get your favorite kind or trade with all of your friends so that everybody gets the ones they want (personally, I always tried to get the Skittles).
Halloween is one of those hold over holidays. It falls between the 4th of July and Thanksgiving, and you don't get a day off of work or school for the holiday, so it's not quite as important as other holidays. It is a good holiday for corporate America though, as nearly $2 billion worth of candy is bought every year for Halloween. This is a huge influx into the economy because candy that isn't usually as popular begins to boom, such as candy corn and mini-sized candy bars.
Halloween is a holiday that is definitely geared towards younger children, with costumes being premade and available for purchase at any Fred Meyer or grocery store. That doesn't mean that just kids get to enjoy it though. College kids like us go out and have fun, or we have little get-togethers with our friends where we all get to see each other's costumes. College kids just get to have a little bit different kind of fun than our younger counterparts. Instead of going trick-or-treating, we just go over to friends' houses and take all of their goods instead of taking candy from strangers.
