Haunted House

When Hubby and I purchased our home we were super excited for Halloween. After years of living in apartments with zero Halloween fun, we figured a neighborhood would be totally different.

We envisioned throngs of children dressed in costumes ringing our doorbell begging for candy. We imagined the giggles and shrieks as we passed out tons of sweets, making us the most popular house on the block.

We purchased extra bags of treats to be sure we had enough.

We turned on every light so children and parents knew we were at home. Honestly, you could see our house from space, it was so bright.

As the sun went down, our anticipation grew. The door bell would ring any second now.

Yep, any second. Tic, toc, tic, toc. Any second now.

It got darker. I went outside to make sure the lights were on.

We decided that maybe the previous owners were not kid-friendly and therefore our house had some stigma attached. We brought lawn chairs out front to look more appealing and to give candy to anyone who came within 100 yards of our house. 

Still, nothing.

Honestly, there weren’t any kids to be seen on our street. Not even a squirrel or a cricket.

But we knew our ‘hood was full of kids. What happened? Did we move into a haunted house?

We felt like Linus, all alone in the pumpkin patch waiting for the Great Pumpkin. We feared walking back inside at the end of the evening with our heads hanging in shame having distributed none of our candy.

After a thirty-second pity party, we started to laugh.

It was just a teensy bit funny, two adults sitting outside of a fully decorated lit-up home with bags of candy and not one single trick-or-treater in sight.

We quickly developed Plan B and went into action.

Grabbing our candy and a couple of flashlights we started walking. Didn’t take us long to find Halloween.

The streets behind ours were full of kids running from house to house. Parents had set up BBQ’s in the front yards with coolers and lawn chairs.  There were parties on every block.

We walked up and down, handing out our candy to kids, explaining to parents that we were new to the area. We learned that our street was perceived as having too much car traffic which explained why we had no trick or treat action.

We were invited to have hot dogs and drinks with our new neighbors, even to stay and relax in their lawn chairs.

We kept walking, passing out candy, enjoying this new Halloween tradition and meeting tons of neighbors.

That night, Halloween didn’t go as we had anticipated. The important thing is that we adjusted our plan, had a great evening and made new friends.

Each Halloween I am reminded of that first one in our house, when we sat in the lawn chairs while holding unopened bags of candy and felt like Linus waiting for the Great Pumpkin that would never appear.

And I’m reminded of the lesson we learned about adapting to changing circumstances.

I’ve tried to apply that same lesson to other areas of my life, including work. If something doesn’t go as planned, take a minute to assess the situation, develop Plan B and start moving forward.

It’s better than sitting alone in the pumpkin patch all night, that’s for sure.