We all saw this coming (including the candy companies that preemptively released Halloween packaging in August in an attempt to beat the inevitable coronavirus crackdown), but Halloween is canceled — in L.A., anyway.
Door-to-door trick-or-treating has been officially banned in the county “because it can be very difficult to maintain proper social distancing on porches and at front doors, especially in neighborhoods that are popular with trick or treaters,” the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health said in a news release.
The county, which remains in the first tier of the state’s four-tiered reopening system with 249,241 positive cases as of Tuesday, is also putting the squash on so-called “trunk-or-treating,” in which trick-or-treaters go car-to-car to collect candy rather than door-to-door, as well as Halloween parties with non-household members, even if they’re hosted outside. Also off the table this year are carnivals, festivals, live entertainment and haunted houses.
So how can a Halloween enthusiast observe the holiday in L.A. this year? The county’s Department of Health recommends virtual parties and events, and is also willing to condone socially distanced car parades and other drive-in events in which participants remain in their cars.
The whole thing kind of feels like one of those bizarre stop-motion Christmas specials where an evil warlock or disgruntled political leader tries to ban Christmas and some band of various anthropomorphized entities have to save it in a 60-minute fever dream that once passed for family entertainment, except it’s Halloween and also real life.
Anyway, you may have noticed that all of those COVID-safe Halloween options sound horribly boring and depressing, which is why I, personally, suggest celebrating Halloween this year the way god and nature always intended: alone in a cemetery communing with the dead, and/or alone in your room with an ungodly amount of Halloween candy. The Los Angeles County Department of Health probably can’t tell you that, but I can. Now, let’s all go hit up the nearest CVS, stock up on some Halloween candy which has been available for purchase there for the past month because time isn’t real and we’re living in a bizarre caricature of our former lives, and report to separate cemeteries to commence our socially distanced Halloween celebrations. Happy Halloween everyone.
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