“Childhood Halloween”

“The images of this primitive pagan holiday got stamped firmly on his mind and remained there throughout his life: thought-photographs of his mother applying make-up pencils and creams to his face, memories of being fitted for costume pants that required safety pins to hold them up and of straining anticipation of the hour when the trick-or-treat neighborhood-roaming would begin. He recalled school parties with chocolate cupcakes topped with orange frosting and the exchange of Halloween cards with schoolmates. Fads would come and go in such things. In 4th grade, monster cards were de rigueur; everyone exchanged valentines shaped like Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster, and the Mummy. Everywhere in the school carved pumpkins leered with jagged-toothed grins; inky witches hovered in mid-flight astride their brooms; carbuncled and warted yellow-and-orange gourds recalled harvests long past; and devils dangled from ceilings with red pitchforks and tarry horns, ready to poke, prod, and capture unwary child-souls.”