With Halloween right around the corner, and stores stocking up on candy, I figured it would be a good time to discuss the controversial question of “how old is too old for trick-or-treating.” 

   Before I start, I should mention that most adults often look down upon high schoolers who have nothing better to do on Halloween than ask for candy. But to the contrary, I believe trick-or-treating is for everyone. After all, who cares if the single dude who lives down the street looks you up and down with a questioning glare? At least you got a few packs of Skittles out of the encounter. 

  To get a better understanding of why people stopped trick-or-treating, I decided to go and ask my family and friends. I found that people stop going house-to-house on Halloween because their parents and friends make them feel as if they are too old.

   Essentially, they let their friends convince them that going to a party is a better way to spend Halloween than racking up 500 pieces of free candy in three hours. In fact, the only reason people go to these crappy parties or watch a dumb horror movie is that society tells them that they have aged out of trick-or-treating and have to find something else to do on Halloween. This notion that you age out of trick-or-treating when you reach high school makes people who enjoy dressing up and getting candy feel unable to do what they enjoy in order to be accepted by their friends and neighbors.

   Additionally, some people like to say that once you reach high school, you are too busy to find the time to go trick-or-treating. But if you can find three hours a night to study for tests and do your homework, then you can find the time to go trick-or-treating (it is a simple matter of prioritizing what is important). People will tell you that if you want candy that bad, just go buy it; after all, you can get 200 pieces of candy for 20 bucks at Kroger. However, that mindset is exactly why everyone should go trick-or-treating. There is something about having to endure a brutal night of 20-degree weather during a downpour that teaches you that if you want something, you have to be willing to put in the work.

   There are a lot of things you can do on Halloween, and I understand that trick-or-treating is not for everyone. But if you do want to go trick-or-treating, do not let society tell you that you are “too old”. Because even after you are too old to date Leonardo DiCaprio, you are still young enough to go trick-or-treating.