Spooky Scary Skeletons

It's late October, the year is turning, the weather is cooling and leaves are beginning to fall. Along the streets, signs of Halloween appear. In the shops, ghostly figures gather.

There are a lot of things to do, like planning hayrides and carving pumpkins. The little one wants to be a crow this year, so there's a complicated costume to make. But for me, personally, the most important thing about Halloween isn't dressing up or trick or treat, though naturally this is great fun. It's a spiritual night, the time I feel closest to my ancestors and loved ones who have passed on. They have been known to drop by at any old time of the year, but Halloween is special. The air fairly crackles with it.

My favorite Halloween memories are not of anything dramatic, but small moments infused with an ineffable...something.

The school Fall festivals and playing games under the full moon. Baking pumpkin pie.Crossing the bridge above the creek and hearing the leaves rustle ominously. And then there is my very favorite memory, the time I saw the last trick-or-treater of the night - a young girl dressed as a witch - jump the wrought iron fence on the corner. She could have walked around it, but she jumped instead, and I was so glad. She was about 11, and I knew, with a certain melancholy, that her fence-jumping days would soon be over. For that moment though, she was truly a little witch.
 
And as always, there is the sense that spirits are close at hand.

After midnight, when everyone has gone home, it's time to leave offerings for the dead. There is candy, fruit, and (when I can manage) bread baked in the shape of little men. Scoff all you want, but when you have guests, you should always show them hospitality. Most times the weather is warm, but sometimes cold wind whips around my ankles as I make my rounds. Regardless, it must be done, because this is the essence of it all, the point of connection between the living and the dead.

In our family, we often joke that Halloween is a more important holiday than Thanksgiving or Christmas, our equivalent, and we'll be like the family in the Ray Bradbury story, Homecoming. Perhaps this will be the day everyone will come for the holidays every year, fluttering home like bats through the moonlight.

It's not a bad idea. They know we'll always leave a light on for them.