The moon in the nearly bare walnut trees looked Halloweeny enough. But other than that, today didn't feel like Halloween.
It's the first year my kids didn't go out, costumed, in any capacity. Both worked during the trick-or-treat period.
We'd missed the annual trip to Barthel's to pick apples and pumpkins. So last night at 9 pm, I found the last two orange pumpkins that still had stem handles in the box at Pick 'n Save. Then I bought two bags of eyeballs and body parts--chocolate filled with fudge, peanut butter, or caramel and wrapped in ghoulish foils.
Here in the far southwestern corner of Tosa, a walk around the block is about 2/3rds of a mile. You get a lot of exercise trick-or-treating, so I shouldn't have been surprised that fewer than a dozen kids showed up at the door today. I wish I'd given each one handsful of candy instead of just a couple pieces. As it was, I missed out on the pleasure of leading other people's children astray and into candy hysteria.
It's a transition year. I can feel the whole shape of my life shifting as the kids carve away on college applications instead of pumpkins.
Talk about spooky!
