Trick or fairly traded treat

I've always been ambivalent about Halloween. When I was little, my sisters and I dressed up and went trick-or-treating, but we weren't allowed to wear scary costumes. (Or rather, nothing supernatural and scary--my sister's Raggedy Ann getup [left] screams "scary clown.")

Later my parents rejected trick-or-treating entirely, sending us instead to an alternate "harvest party" at church each year. We wore creative Bible costumes: I as the rock Moses struck for water (in a black garbage bag with a hole for a squirt gun), my sister as the salt of the earth (in a rock salt bag), my sister and I as Martha and Lazarus (I wrapped in rags, she periodically delivering the King Jamesian punchline, "He stinketh!").

Later still, we avoided the trick-or-treaters by leaving the house for the afternoon or hiding in the basement with a movie.