Halloween

I must say I don't like the holiday. I liked it as a kid, alright, but even then in my little town in Kansas, very ornery things took place. One year they turned a truckload of hay into a bonfire at the mainstreet intersection. Another year, my car was egg-ed just by driving down main street with some friends. There was always a dance at city hall (I was not to dare go near it by orders of the parents) and someone would end up drunk and get into some fight or whatever. My dad was the mayor, and so there were Halloween holidays when I wasn't even allowed to leave the house. He was riding with the patrol cars and didn't want his daughter out on that "evil filled" night. Other Halloweens I dressed up, went to all the relatives' homes and neighbors and filled my sack up with treats.

But here some ___ years later, I dread the day. Yesterday was a very interesting day. At WalMart, there was an organization taking signatures out front for a petition to legalize marijuana. You should have seen the people I saw signing the petition. Pitiful. The next thing was that I'm pretty sure a vampire checked me out at WalMart and they weren't in costume. The next thing I saw was people leaving the grocery store REFUSING the remembrance poppies that our soldiers were passing out. There were as many cars out and shoppers shopping as there are on Christmas Eve.

You ask, "why would you ever go to those stores on that holiday?" Because our church was hosting a festival for families in our community, our school, and our sports program. I had to get some last minute items to do my part.

I know the original holiday All Saints (Hallowed) Eve was for good reason. But just like many other things, our culture has turned it into something more greedy and ugly.

It was heart warming, at our Harvest Festival, to see the children come by our Spiderman decorated trunk in our 1963 Plymouth Fury. I had a ball toss game for them to play before they picked out a treat from my overflowing bowl of goodies. The parents who insist on taking turns, looking me in the eye to say thank you, and then say thank you themselves along with the number of children actually with their parents gives me hope. What started out to be discouraging ended on an encouraging note. The eyes, chubby hands, and bright hope of children is good to be reminded of.