A Guising We Will Go

a-lumberjack-walkedHave you ever heard of guising? I was researching some Halloween history as part of my October challenge and learned about the history of trick or treating. The History Channel has a great video (see it here) that explains lots of  Halloween traditions, including guising.

Long before kids walked from door to door dressed as stormtroopers, Elsa, or Donald Trump hoping for full-sized candy bars, adults walked door to door and entertained people with songs, poetry, and jokes hoping for fine wine and good cheese. This was called “guising”.

I like the idea of guising. What if instead of saying “Trick or Treat!” we had to tell a joke in order to get candy. I think Halloween would be much more fun with a little more give and take. A child would only need to know one joke so it wouldn’t be hard, even for young children.

As an example, my darling nephew, who is three, told me this joke that he learned from his Leapfrog tablet.

Knock Knock

Who’s there?

Cow go.

Cow go who?

No. Cow go moo!

I’d give any child a full-sized candy bar if they told me that joke. Too funny! The internet is full of good jokes, bad jokes, Halloween jokes, and classic jokes. Here’s another example.

Q. Why do demons and ghouls hang out together?

A. Because demons are a ghouls best friend! (I got that great joke from a great Halloween website. They had dozens for Halloween jokes.)

Let’s go guising this Halloween. Laughter is the best treat there is.

Usually I put a quote here, but I am supposed to do a call to action for my platform challenge that I mentioned in the last post. So I’m calling you to act. Leave a comment explaining which Halloween traditions you like, or wish would be brought back. Or why not guise me with a great joke.