Boo!

Once again it’s time. It’s time to disguise our children and send them out on the street to beg for candy. It’s time for Karo-syrup with red food coloring, and haunted houses made of cardboard jammed into the garage. It’s time for grownups to buy candy for a parade of children, and vow once again not to eat ANY of it ourselves.

Tiny witches and goblins, fairies and ninjas, pirates, Darths and cowboys will line the sidewalks once again. In the spirit of the season, darkened houses will be fearsome black holes in the night and barking dogs become the spirits of werewolves haunting suburbia.

Parents will wander among the younger spooks, holding hands and smiling at the rapture of a child’s face that has just discovered she can get chocolate for the asking. With each stop the wonder grows until she beams with the knowledge that one day a year, stolid rule-making adults are such easy pushovers.

We will sit in the driveway with lawn chairs and a camping table between us holding hot tea. We will watch the parade as they wend down the street looking for more easy marks from which to extort sugar. We will ohh and ahhh over the clever costumes and be frightened of monsters in age appropriate fashion.

And as the lights fade, and the trick-or-treaters slowly disappear, the stars will come out and we will remain basking in cold air. We will watch flickering pinpoints of light in a black sky and dream dreams of small delighted moments in childhood, when a piece of chocolate was a foil wrapped kiss.

Happy Halloween to all.