The day after Halloween. What happened and what it taught.

We went to five houses on the street — we know our neighbours well enough for this — and at the fourth one, he rang the doorbell and the man who opened the door was also in an extremely convincing costume, and my son made a sound I have never heard him make before and stepped back very quickly.

The man laughed. My son laughed. The man gave him twice the usual amount of sweets, perhaps out of guilt, perhaps because the reaction had been so genuine. My son ate one on the pavement and said: 'That was actually very scary. I want to go back.'

We went back to number twelve twice more in the course of the evening. He never stopped being startled, and he never stopped going back.

I've been thinking about this sequence all week. The being frightened and the going back are not in opposition — they are the same impulse. The fright is what makes the return valuable. If the man at the door had not been frightening, going back would have been boring. The scare is the point.

Bravery that costs nothing is not bravery. The small costs — the doorbell, the stranger's house, the uncertainty about what they'd find — are what makes the evening matter.

Bravery that costs nothing is not bravery. The small costs — the doorbell, the stranger's house, the uncertainty about what they'd find — are what makes the evening matter.

The small costs are what makes the evening matter.