Ding Dong Ditch Day
There are moments that remind us of childhood, flashes of harmless rebellion and freedom. Memories that bind us not through a shared timeline, but through traditions that transcend decades. And then there are moments that pull you back, that let you linger in them for a while. For me, that reminder came crashing into reality a few months ago when my 8-year-old son asked what it was like to ding dong ditch.
It was a simple question, but one that was followed by a pang of guilt. How did I manage to skip this rite of childhood? Something so minute, yet steeped in nostalgia. How had he not known the rush? Sneaking up to a door, ringing the bell, and running for your life. The sound of sneakers hitting the pavement and a heart pounding with the certainty of being caught.
To ease my self-pity, I rationalized that times were different (as every generation likes to posture). When I was young, the cranky neighbor who hated kids cutting across their lawn—let alone ringing their doorbell—didn’t have a camera to monitor your every move or social media to broadcast it. Things seemed simpler. Still, I wanted that innocence for him.
So I promised we’d try someday, and life went on.
But through the everyday hustle and bustle, ding dong ditch slipped into the background, tucked somewhere between summertime shenanigans and laundry. That was until one afternoon, scrolling Facebook, I stumbled on a post in the ‘I Live in Pueblo West’ group. In bold letters, it read: COMMUNITY DING DONG DITCH DAY!
It was a perfect match, an evening organized like Halloween in summer. Porch lights marked who was in. Parents tagged along for safety, neighbors were asked first and played the part, and the game stayed the same. Hit the bell and run!
The idea was sparked by the group’s admin, Rhonda Sposato, who had seen a TikTok of a man sneaking up to his older parents’ house for ding dong ditch style pranks, sometimes with his own child in tow. Wanting her grandchildren to have that same kind of fun, she organized with family and friends to make it happen. “I thought why are you keeping this to yourself,” she explained. “This needs to be a community event.”
By the time the day arrived, my son had mapped out entire strategies for how he planned to play. He knew when to run, where to hide, and how to outsmart whoever might open the door. But our neighborhood doesn’t have many kids, and that night it was quiet. The event was new, and plenty of people hadn’t even heard about it yet. Wanting to give him the chance he’d been waiting for, I turned to the same place I’d first learned about it—the ‘I Live in Pueblo West’ page—and people responded. They offered up their doorbells, and probably their sanity. And we hopped in the car to drive across Pueblo West, chasing down every porch light we could find.
At one house, a woman played along, darting into the yard to catch him while he crouched behind a rock. At another, a man’s playful ‘Hey, what are you doing?’ ended in a fist bump and laughter. After every house, my son, cheeks flushed and eyes wide, sprinted back to me, proud that he finally knew the thrill of being a ding dong ditcher.
It wasn’t a crowd, and it wasn’t every block. Still, the people who said yes made it feel larger than it was. Families who had never met us before welcomed us with humor. Strangers were simply happy to provide a safe place to play, and even the camera footage I had once worried about was shared later with laughter. As we drove between houses, I realized the night was not only about a childhood game. It was about the small ways people choose to connect.
That became even more clear when others began sharing their own stories of ding dong ditch. When I told friends what we were doing, their faces lit up. Some remembered sprinting barefoot across cul-de-sacs. Others laughed about angry adults who threatened to call the cops. A few recalled doing it on random holidays like May Day. Everyone carried some version of a memory.
And it’s these bits of connection and community that matter.
Ding dong ditch might seem trivial, but it is universal. It links old and young, rich and poor, people who might never otherwise speak. These are the small reminders that we share more in common than we often think. On this night, no one needed reminding. They simply lived it.
It was exactly what Sposato had hoped for when she first imagined the event. “I want kids to have innocent fun and know that there is more out there than what they’re offered,” she said. She hopes it will grow into something that happens each month in the summer.
Maybe that’s why these small traditions matter. They show us who we are together. Like children, they remind us of our shared humanity. I think back to my son’s original question: What is it like to ding dong ditch? Watching him, I know now the answer was not in the ringing or the running. It was in the joy of being part of something more. And I think Pueblo West felt that too.
