To go out or not to go out is the perennial question, which sooner or later every junior high-aged student must face.
The youths gathered outside Lorne Akins School Thursday all agreed where the best candy in town can be found — Woodlands —and most also said they hardly ever eat all their junk. But they also had mixed emotions about when to call it quits.
“It depends how tall you are,” said Grade 8 student Brendan Kelly, who guessed he might go with younger siblings and that might justify at least one more year of Halloween fun for him.
“It helps if you have a younger brother or sister,” he said.
Kelly and his friends Dejan Zoric and Noah Bodnarek had ambitious plans to roam as far as they could this Halloween. They were anticipating getting great bags full of candy, but perhaps even more enticing was the thought of being a bit scared.
“There was this guy on Woodlands Road last year who started a chainsaw when we got near his house. He chased us with it. Then he gave us hot chocolate,” Zoric said.
The first Halloween dropout marker appears to happen as the students go into Grade 9.
Scott Bedard, Carter McKinley and Nicole Serbu, all 14 and in Grade 9, judged themselves too old to go out.
“I went out last year, but this time I’m going to watch scary movies and hand out candy,” said Serbu.
Taylor Corrigal and her friend Cassidy Goodman are also 14 and in Grade 9 and they plan to dress up and get their parents to drive them to Woodlands, Oakmont and perhaps Erin Ridge, where they judged the candy picking might be pretty good.
Goodman worried that this year could be her last year as a trick or treater because she thinks the invisible Halloween line is drawn after junior high school.
“Is this our last year?” she asked her friend.
“I think we go out until it’s inappropriate to go to people’s houses. I think we stay a kid as long as we can,” said a reassuring Goodman.
But some youths had a complaint against the generous folks that give them candy. It seems the older the kids get, the more likely it is that householders try to trick them.
“I hate it when people ask us to sing. I wish people wouldn’t ask us to do that,” said Grade 9 student Tatyanah McCallum.
