Hallowe'en greetings
We are not in costumes (though I have worn an orange skull & crossbones shirt all day) and we are not out pressing our luck for sweets, but it is indeed Hallowe’en. The Boy has never experienced an American Hallowe’en, so his reactions have been hilarious. Especially to the amount of candy collected by children we have seen. The same day in our neighbourhood usually consists of between four and six children adding a black plastic rubbish bag to their school uniform (white shirt, black trousers and blazer) and claiming to be Dracula along with a little sister in a Disney princess nightgown. Here, on the other hand, we got to see dozens of kids in brilliantly creative costumes trick or treating at the shops in Fremont. Our special prize for the best costume absolutely ever went to the most adorable nine year old Edward Scissorhands. To the point that he couldn’t pick up sweets from the bowl by himself! (Sadly, the prize itself is probably disappointing to a kid, unless nine year olds appreciate it when I clap and tell their parents that their costume is the greatest.)
Of course this shortly resulted in stories of trick or treating past (along with an explanation of how there’s not really a ‘trick’ element for most kids). The last year I went trick or treating as a kid, I was pushing it for being way too old, but several of us went together and dressed up as the different Heathers from Heathers. The neighbours probably didn’t have a clue and just gave us candy because it was a small neighbourhood. But the worst bit I only fully appreciate now.
Our neighbourhood was about 40 houses, 39 of which were built in the late 1970s or early 80s, I’m guessing. The remaining one was an old farm house that hadn’t been painted in decades and was hidden from the road by skeletal trees. An older lady lived there and no one referred to her by her first name, including the adults. She was widowed and lived alone and that was enough to make the children of the neighbourhood absolutely terrified of her. I have no explanation for this other than that innocent kind of ignorance that exists only when you are seven years old. Anyway, if we were scared of her on a normal day, we were petrified on the 31st of October. Every year, we could see there was a light on. Some kids were brave enough to make it to her front porch (probably a result of a dare) and reported that there was a table outside the front door filled with freshly baked cakes and cookies. Well, this was already the era of checking your candy before you were allowed to eat it, so this was just another sign that she was to be feared. Those cakes were probably laced with ten million poisons, you know! To my knowledge, none of us actually ate the cakes from the supposedly haunted house.
When I was in high school, there was a huge article in our little six page weekly local newspaper. The lady we were convinced was the wicked witch of 183rd street? She’d won a national bake-off championship for the Junior Service League, or something similar. They interviewed her and printed one of her recipes and she said how much she enjoyed baking for friends and neighbours and children and…
Yes. For years, I had the opportunity to eat some of the best cookies and cupcakes in all of America. And I was too busy squealing in fright at the front gate. Gutted.
Happy evening of candy and costumes.
xlovesx
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