The importance of Oct. 31

The day after Halloween last year, my daughter told me what she was going to be for this Halloween. Then, a couple of times over the summer, she told me that she had been thinking about Halloween and had changed her mind. Of course, the costume choice changed twice more in the weeks leading up to the Big Day. She ended up – many glue gun burns to my fingers later – being a garbage can, complete with garbage.

The point is Halloween is very important to my daughter. It ranks up there with Christmas and her birthday.

Deane, on the other hand, has always been rather ambivalent about Halloween. Over the years, we made the big effort to turn his wheelchair into everything from Captain Feathersword’s pirate ship, to a city bus, a school bus and a subway car. More recently he has been Bono, a basketball player and Gene Simmons. He was not a huge fan of the really spooky stuff some of our neighbours do, but his father always made it fun.

This year, Deane was as anxious for Oct. 31 to come as his sister. It was not because he had overcome his fear of approaching scary houses or that we had come up with the ultimate wheelchair costume. Since April, Deane has been waiting for Halloween night because it was the home opener of his beloved  Toronto Raptors’ regular season.

In the lead up to Halloween, many friends and relatives asked what Deane was going to for Halloween. Because he doesn’t look 14 and, for the most part, doesn’t act like a teenager, we often forget that he’s not a kid and doesn’t want to do kid things.

So despite the chaos of getting my daughter in her costume and off to meet her friends, relatives arriving and trick-or-treaters coming to the door, Deane could

Deane as a school bus driver when he was much younger.

not have been happier sitting in front of the TV.

Sounds like a typical teenager  to me.