I never watched any of the ten Halloween movies, American
Horror Story, Nightmare on Elm Street or Psycho. “It’s the Great Pumpkin,Charlie Brown!”
is more my taste. And I’d rather hear Hedwig’s theme from Harry Potter than Monster Mash.
But I have a photograph from when I was six years old that
shows my older brother and his friends and I sprawled out on the family room
floor trading candy, and the photograph makes me smile.
Costumes aren’t just for little ones though; my husband and
I were Raggedy Ann and Andy for our first Halloween together. And, on one of my
oldest daughter’s earliest Halloweens, dressed as a clown, I joined a group of costumed
parents and kids to travel house to house for treats. Ten years later, pickin’ my
five-string banjo, I accompanied my younger daughter as we went door to
door. And last year, I channeled NCIS’ Abby Sciuto,
minus the coffin, for our congregation’s Trunk or Treat event.
This year, with my daughters away at school and
without a neighborhood with many trick or treaters, my favorite autumn treats are
setting a pumpkin on the hearth and enjoying the spectacular palette with which
God paints our mountains and trees in North Carolina.
