It's sweater time! I dig out my dusty slippers from under the bed, put away those tank tops, try on last year's corduroys just to make sure...October: Falling leaves. Chilly breezes. Foggy mornings. Darker nights. I turn on my oven. I pull out my crockpot. We bake. We braise.
October may be my favorite month. Change is never more evident than this month that celebrates the macabre, Death, even. The season changes our shade trees to candy corn yellows, oranges, reds, dark purples. Even the produce turns dark. I begin my autumnal feast: a cornucopia of roasted root vegetables baked in a pumpkin, stuffed sweet potatoes, butternut squash filled with wild rice and brussels sprouts, a trilogy of potatoes layered like plaid in my casserole. It could be a mellow celebration: golds, browns, ambers, except that this transition is turned upside-down by impending glee: October 31st.
There is candy coming! My family feels this like the first rumblings of an earthquake: a little fear, a little excitement, eyes wide. "We are going to be zombies! No....vampires. Um...zombies, maybe." This becomes our dinnertime chant.
We've spent the last month readjusting to 'get-up-on-time,' 'do-your-homework-first' lectures, and 'not-on-a-school-night' sighs. We look up from our work and find, delighted, that our home has become a party. Here we are! I have framed my doorway with flying bats, replaced the family photos with pumpkins and skulls, exchanged those white plates for black with crows. My house is full of cobwebs--purposefully!--and Scary is lurking around every corner. Ghosts moan. Spiders greet you unexpectedly. Skeletons freak out my dog, my children, my guests. We giggle. We scream. We are orange and black! We are afraid!
We measure our Haunted Trail Mix, assemble Candy-Corn Jello, bake bleeding cupcakes, spin cobweb cookies in the mixer, ice the tombstone cakes, lay out the skeleton meringues. "We are going to be mummies. No! Vampires! Maybe pirates...Hmmm." We flip pumpkin pancakes, bake pumpkin bread, decorated pumpkin muffins, and toast those pumpkin seeds. Finally, we stab that pumpkin--killing to create. So October!
Skeleton hands pop up in the yard. Mice scurry across the table. We eat brain: cakes, jello, popsicles! "We are zombies!" Our delight brightens the darkness that creeps into our house. Halloween is S-C-A-R-Y! Dark. Creepy. It makes you shudder. It gives you goosebumps. It may make you scream! It is the ultimate month-long rollercoaster. We cuddle, creating a campfire in our racing hearts, as we read scary stories, do the Monster Mash, and finally decide: "We are going to be goblins. No...maybe vampires...."
Halloween is S-C-A-R-Y. Just don't let my kids know....
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