fresnelly

For one thing, you're not a child anymore and you're old enough to see the commercialization and greed of the holiday.

As you age Halloween has different meanings.

As a young child, it's pretty magical: choosing a costume, staying out late at night, buckets full of candy...

As an older child, the candy begins to take precedence and the night's meaning revolves around aquisition.

Finally, as a young teenager you don't look so cute in a costume anymore so you don't get a good reception trick or treating. Perhaps you're drawn to the "scarier" and gorier costumes. The innocence and magic of the holiday is gone and you're too wrapped up in teenage nihilism anyways.

Then, in college, there's a resurgence when you discover the "Adult" halloween party. You can push your character farther than before: Girls wear revealing outfits and guys experiment with drag. Everyone is drunk and hedonistic and you feel you're connecting with the Holiday's true pagan roots.

And then you're out of college and it's all been done before and you're in a serious relationship so there's no need to flaunt your sexuality and you have to work the next day and candy makes you fat and the only real spectre on Halloween is rampant consumerism.

Perhaps it ends there and that's where you are.

Now that our son is old enough to Trick or Treat, the holiday is born anew and we're having lots of fun creating our own traditions and taking lots of pictures. It's fun again.

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Building an artificial intelligence that appreciates Mozart is easy. Building an A.I. that appreciates a theme restaurant is the real challenge - Kit Roebuck - Nine Planets Without Intelligent Life