I love holidays. I really do. They’re all great – Christmas, Thanksgiving, The Fourth of July, Labor Day, Memorial Day. By far, my favorite time of the year is between Thanksgiving and Christmas, better known to most as Advent. I love the anticipation, excitement, commotion, lights, and music – yes, the music. I’ll admit to being a Christmas music junkie. I’m sure that I drive my family crazy with the incessant playing of Christmas music in the car throughout December.

However, there’s one holiday that I could do without. I often wonder why it is even considered a holiday. It’s Halloween.

It was cool when I was growing up. Who didn’t like dressing up in those cheesy cartoon character masks and plastic ponchos, getting free candy, and scouring the neighborhood for the only house that was giving out the full-size candy bars. I can still vividly remember coming home with a pillow case full of candy, dumping it out on my bedroom floor, and spending a good couple of hours trading candy with my friends and younger sister to get the ultimate blend of sweets that would last you through Thanksgiving or so.

While the candy part was good, I was never into the other side of Halloween. I didn’t enjoy the haunted houses and went to very few growing up, mostly out of peer pressure. I didn’t get the point of paying to go to a place where they tried to scare you to the point of having nightmares. Also, all of the talk of witches, ghosts and goblins neither fascinated nor interested me.

Maybe I’m just getting old and crotchety, but I’m just not into the whole costume, dress-up thing. Carving pumpkins isn’t my thing. Celebrating witches and ghosts feels wrong. It’s strange seeing pop-up costume stores to take advantage of the holiday. It seems weird people putting lights on their houses and littering their lawns with Halloween paraphernalia. For some, it’s a bigger holiday than Christmas. It doesn’t feel right. It’s not even clear to me what we’re celebrating. I mean, even the kids have the day off from school this year. How ridiculous is that? Seriously, I just don’t get it.

So am I planning to boycott Halloween? No, not yet at least.

I’ll indulge my kids and take them trick-or-treating, although Lisa will probably do the chaperoning. I’ll answer our front door and pass out candy. I’ll grin and bear it and make it through the evening. Just don’t expect me to dress-up, decorate my house, or be festive. In fact, if you told me this was the last year for Halloween, I wouldn’t miss it. I’d celebrate it.