Cold, Colors, and Candy


As published first in the Kendallville Mall:


Slightly Off the Mark

Unless you’re one of those people of questionable sanity who likes cold weather, October has little to offer Hoosiers except autumn colors and Halloween.

But by Halloween the leaves have usually fallen and the days are short. This gives me a feeling of bleakness and dread that … come to think of it, bleakness and dread are very Halloweenie.

But no matter how you feel about the weather (it stinks), Halloween is the beginning of snack season. Through Thanksgiving and Christmas and on to Valentine’s Day, we get to pack on a nice layer of fat against the cold.

It doesn’t really help. But what the heck, any excuse for chocolate.

As with most things, Halloween is more fun to kids. These days I’m expected to turn on my porch light and give candy to other people. I’d rather hide in the dark and let the dog scare off anyone who approaches. There’s a cocoa shortage, people—chocolate charity begins at home.

But when I was younger, it was one of the highlights of the year. In elementary school we’d spend October making decorations of ghosts, witches, and of course pumpkins with scary faces.

I wonder if that’s allowed, these days? They’ve probably banned that kind of stuff from public schools, along with cardboard pilgrims and anything Christmas. I liked the pilgrims, although even then I knew they’d be toast without Squanto and his corn crop (not that they had any toast).

Where was I? Oh yeah—candy. My family didn’t exactly hand out candy like candy … back then treats were, well, a treat. But on one glorious night we could collect enough candy to keep us going until Thanksgiving.

It wasn’t seen as a dangerous holiday, at the time. (This would be in the 70s. No, wait. Let’s change that to the 80s. Yeah, the 80s.) On the contrary, this was the night when it was quite literally okay to take candy from strangers.

Our dad would load us into the back of his El Camino for a trip to the store, which had highly flammable costumes and masks that rendered us mostly blind, then—

Oh, the El Camino? Well, it’s kind of a half car, half pickup truck. We didn’t worry about belting into the too-small front, because there were no seat belts.

Anyway, we waited until it got pitch dark and then hit the streets, methodically knocking on every door. Sometimes we’d get apples, which was not exactly a jump for joy moment. Packaged candy was okay, but the really nice people would make things from scratch, like those wonderful popcorn balls or caramel apples—which beat plain apples hands down.

The only glitch I remember is when we reached the home of a deaf old fellow who had no idea it was Halloween. He was probably the guy who later invented the idea of only trick or treating at homes with porch lights on. Or, maybe he was hoarding his chocolate.

Just as our parents passed out the last of their candy, we got home with more candy. It was important to eat the homemade stuff, like caramel apples and popcorn balls, first. If you weren’t too much of a glutton, you could string the rest along for weeks.

The times were so much less dangerous.

Now, some of you might be horrified by this. Some might smile at the exaggeration, then be horrified to discover it wasn’t an exaggeration: That’s the way it happened for some of us in the small towns of the mid-70s—I mean, 80s. This was a time when, if we did something stupid like walk in the middle of the street, our parents would get three phone calls and be standing at the front door by the time we made it home. When everyone knows everyone else, it’s not as dangerous as it sounds on paper.

We did know about the dangers, as shown in the very first short story I ever had published, in the late … 80s. It was about a hungry vampire who drinks his own blood after biting down on a razor blade inside a Halloween apple. If anyone still has that old copy of the Central Noble High School Cat Tracks, you’ll find the story to be very, very bad.

Just the same, the worst thing we ever experienced was a tummy ache.

As is sometimes necessary with marriage, my wife examines me for brains.

16 comments:

  1. We lived in the countryside, so trick or treating did involve one of the parents driving along with us for those many stretches between the small clusters of houses.

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    1. For space purposes, I didn't describe the part about how I moved into town when I was about fourteen ... before that, we'd go to a cousin's house, and set out from there.

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  2. My Halloween was very similar to William's.

    But as you say, Mark--any excuse for chocolate. I love autumn!

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    1. Early autumn's okay ... around now the leaves finish falling, it gets cold and ugly, and I don't like it at all.

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  3. I lived in a small town with only four hills sitting on a circular road. We had to drive from one hill to the next. I love Halloween, just not the cold.

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    1. I'd love Halloween a lot more without the cold! It's supposed to be around 50 during my brother's Halloween party Saturday, and just go down from there.

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  4. We lived on a farm and no farmer in their right mind would waste gasoline driving a child around to get candy. If you wanted something sweet, go to the cookie jar or get a graham cracker. I am not saying how many years that was before the 1970's. One time in the late 1960's I passed out 200 pieces of candy. That was in Phoenix. By the way, William likes the cold weather.

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    1. Yes, I'm well aware of William's questionable sanity!

      The rural people around here would often carpool the kids into the nearest town for trick or treating.

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  5. Thank goodness all that trick or treating hasn't really caught on over here yet. And being one of the questionable people who actually likes the cold, bring it on I say, because it keeps the brats, er little dears, off the streets.

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    1. It wouldn't keep them off the streets around here! But it does sometimes mean costumes are covered with overcoats.

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  6. Loved this post Mark, you always make me laugh but this time there was the added attraction of nostalgia! I don’t think seat belts were invented when I went trick or treating, besides which most of the travelling I did was on the wheel arch of dad’s tractor. Kids today don’t know they’re born …

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    1. I remember riding on the wheel arch of the tractor! Loved that -- it never occurred to me that for other people it was a job.

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  7. Loved this post Mark, you always make me laugh but this time there was the added attraction of nostalgia! I don’t think seat belts were invented when I went trick or treating, besides which most of the travelling I did was on the wheel arch of dad’s tractor. Kids today don’t know they’re born …

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    1. I don't know why I didn't reply tdo this, but I remember riding the wheel arch of my neighbor's tractor!

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  8. Brings back fond memories and I certainly do remember El Caminos

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    1. I remember riding in the back of one on a trip down to Fort Wayne ... about thirty miles or so.

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