Hallowe'en

 

October 31, 2022

Hallowe’en

Knee aflame. I wonder if it’s gout moving upstream?

Bluebirds inhabited my garden for the last few days. I wait till now to give thanks. 

Bill Henderson has died in Ohio. His article said he left scores of descendants. 

My first trick-or-treat night I was dressed as Robin Hood and I went with older neighborhood kids. The kids– who long ago have left memory– were attentive and kind to me. It was raining. I thought of that as a kind of betrayal.

One time we ventured up the hill into the older houses in Goodyear Heights, where the people were more established and gave better treats. We were scolded for this afterward in a spasm of self-segregation. 

One year the feature was a haunted house down at the end of Goodview. I still remember it with wonder, and hope that the people in the house, wherever they are now, are gratified. 

In fifth grade I had planned out what I felt would be my last trick-or-treat adventure. I was very attentive to the stages of growing up, which I assumed were holy and eternal, wherefore I was disappointed when others didn’t allow them to be sacraments. As I was doning my costume, my father came to my room and said. “You’re not going out tonight. You’re going to stay here and work in the garden.” I asked why, expecting that the answer would be “because I said so.” In that I was not disappointed. So there I was in complete dark, pulling out spent corn stalks and whatnot, wondering what signal I had missed. There was never an explanation. I was not told I had transgressed in some way. . . nothing. If there was meant to be a lesson attached to it, it was lost in “because I said so.” It lingers as a cruelty. Father’s arbitrariness was, if looked at in a certain way, and intriguing mystery. But not to a child trying to understand how to behave. 

I remember the night I went to Scandals topless, dressed as a Genie. I was very, very popular. 

I remember running in the Hiram graveyard with George and Denny and others on a Hallowe’en with a full moon.

I’ve lived in this house for 8 years and no one has come trick-or-treating. My side of Lakeshore is hellacious for pedestrians, as there are no sidewalks. 

My maples are beautiful even now that the peak has passed.