Hey! Welcome to the first Away Msgs. Grab something out of the Halloween candy you bought “for the trick-or-treaters” and get comfortable. We have some very important childhood business to discuss.
Remember When…
Your costume was under a coat
Remember when Halloween started at school? Orange construction paper everywhere. A classroom party. A cupcake with enough frosting to permanently change the color of your mouth.
You spent the entire afternoon waiting to go home so you could spend the entire evening waiting for it to get dark.
Then it was finally time, and your mom appeared with a coat.
You explained that witches do not wear coats. She explained that you were going to wear one. So you went as a witch who was apparently headed to a ski resort.
If you lived somewhere warm, please know the rest of us were deeply jealous.
Out came the plastic pumpkin bucket. Or a pillowcase, if you had serious plans. Your shoes were already bothering you. Your vampire teeth made it impossible to talk. None of this mattered because someone had heard the house at the end of the street was giving out full-size candy bars.
That information traveled fast for a generation without group texts.
There were wet leaves stuck to your shoes, fake cobwebs catching on everything, and at least one decoration you confidently approached until it moved.
Then came the best part. Home. Shoes off. Candy dumped on the living room floor.
Chocolate over here. Fruity stuff over there. The little box of raisins placed directly into the pile of things that had personally offended you.
You and your siblings began trading. Suddenly everyone understood supply and demand.
Someone tried to get a Reese’s for two peppermints. Nice try.
The television was on. Your face paint was starting to itch. You were allowed to stay up a little later, and there was still so much candy left.
Honestly, I would like one more night like that.
Although now we’re the ones checking the forecast. And annoyingly, the coat makes sense.
On Repeat
“Thriller” by Michael Jackson
The second it started, you had to do the hands. You know the hands.
The rest of the choreography was between you and God, but for those few seconds, you were in the video.
It’s worth watching the whole thing again, especially if your memory has edited it down to a red jacket and some enthusiastic shoulder movements. There was a lot going on before anyone even started dancing.
Channel Surfing
The Boy Meets World episode that went a little too hard
“And Then There Was Shawn.” Season 5, episode 17.
You sat down expecting Cory, Topanga, and a few jokes. Then everyone was stuck in detention with a masked killer, and suddenly this felt like a situation an adult should have reviewed.
Jennifer Love Hewitt even showed up.
Fun fact: it actually aired in February 1998. Apparently they were ready to scare us whenever.
The Thing Everyone Wanted
Another Goosebumps book. Obviously.
The raised lettering. Those covers. Walking into the book fair with money and immediately deciding you were emotionally prepared for a haunted dummy.
You’d read under the covers, hear one noise, and suddenly need a drink of water. From the kitchen. Where the adults were.
For a little bookshelf nostalgia, there’s a Goosebumps Retro Scream Collection. Equally acceptable: borrowing one from the library and finding out whether a paperback can still make you check the closet.
Pop Quiz
No Googling. We’re working with whatever your brain kept instead of useful information.
- What’s the family name of the three witch sisters in Hocus Pocus?
- Who wrote the Goosebumps books?
- What was the talking cat’s name in the ’90s Sabrina the Teenage Witch?
Answers below. Give yourself an extra point if you remembered your childhood phone number while thinking about this.
Before you go: what was the candy you always traded for, and what were you desperately trying to get rid of? Hit reply. I feel like this could tell us a lot about each other.
Send this to the friend who would have gone straight back to the full-size candy bar house in a different costume.
brb, remembering.
Ashley
Quiz answers
- Sanderson.
- R.L. Stine.
- Salem.