Halloween Season

Chapter Thirty-One

By the time October arrived, summer had finally surrendered.

The garden was winding down. The canning jars were lined up on shelves. The air had changed.

You could smell it before you could see it.

Leaves drifted across the yard. The mornings were colder. The evenings arrived earlier.

And for a kid, that could only mean one thing.

Halloween was coming.

Halloween wasn't a single day. It was a season.

The first sign was the roadside pumpkin stands. Every year they seemed to appear overnight. One day there was an empty corner lot. The next day it was filled with pumpkins of every shape and size.

Some were perfectly round. Others looked like they had survived a war.

To me they were all treasures.

We would walk among them, searching for the perfect pumpkin. Not too small. Not too big. Just right. The one that would become our masterpiece.

Back then carving pumpkins wasn't something you bought in a box. You sat at the kitchen table and imagined. A scary face. A goofy face. A monster. Whatever your imagination could create.

Later in life I would discover Pumpkin Masters templates. Suddenly you could transfer detailed patterns onto a pumpkin and carve things that looked professionally made.

But those early pumpkins were different.

Those were ours.

Crooked smiles. Uneven eyes. Accidental cuts. Each one unique. Each one perfect.

The closer Halloween got, the more excitement built. The stores filled with costumes. The schools decorated classrooms. The neighborhoods came alive.

And then finally Halloween night arrived.

My brothers and sisters and I would head out into the darkness.

No parents escorting us. No GPS tracking us. No cell phones.

Just kids.

A whole army of kids spreading through Fairplain.

I remember walking forever. Twenty blocks didn't seem unusual. Maybe it was more. Maybe it was less. Distances are hard to judge when you're a child.

But I remember being tired by the end. I remember carrying a heavy bag. And I remember refusing to quit while there was still candy to be collected.

Every porch light was an opportunity. Every ringing doorbell carried possibility.

A chocolate bar. A candy bar. Maybe something amazing. Maybe disappointment.

There was strategy involved. You learned which houses gave out the good stuff. You learned which ones handed out tiny candies.

And you definitely learned which ones gave away apples.

I never understood the apples.

Why would anyone ruin Halloween by handing out fruit?

Even worse were candy apples.

I loved caramel. Still do. But wrapping caramel around something healthy felt like a betrayal.

Chocolate was the prize. Chocolate was victory. Everything else was simply taking up valuable space in the bag.

Then there were those peanut butter chews. The orange and black wrapped candies. Every Halloween seemed to include them.

I never hated them. I just never understood them.

They were the candy equivalent of getting socks for Christmas.

You ate them because they existed. Not because you wanted them.

Eventually the night would end. We would return home exhausted and excited.

And then came the inspection.

This was serious business.

One year I seem to remember candy actually being taken somewhere for X-rays. Maybe a hospital. Maybe my memory is exaggerating. But the fear of hidden razor blades and poisoned candy was very real back then.

Most years, though, the inspection happened at home.

Frank would dump the bags out. Candy would spread across the floor like treasure from a pirate chest.

Then came the sorting.

Chocolate here. Hard candy there. Trading. Negotiating. Arguing. Celebrating.

Every kid suddenly became a businessman.

Looking back, I probably enjoyed that part almost as much as the trick-or-treating itself.

When everything was done, there would usually be hot cocoa.

Outside the wind rattled leaves across the yard. Inside we admired our pumpkins glowing in the darkness.

The shadows danced across the walls.

The season felt magical.

There was something about autumn in Michigan. Something mysterious. Something beautiful.

Even now, when I think about those nights, they remind me of old Edgar Allan Poe stories.

Dark trees. Cold air. Flickering candlelight. A world that felt slightly different after the sun went down.

Maybe that's why those memories have stayed with me.

Halloween wasn't really about the candy. It wasn't about the costumes. It wasn't even about the pumpkins.

It was about imagination.

For one night every year, ordinary neighborhoods became places of adventure. Every dark yard held mystery. Every glowing porch offered possibility.

And for a child growing up in Fairplain, that felt like magic.