Hallowe’en At Boo Manor

Dianne adores Hallowe’en. It is, quite possibly, her favourite holiday. Or at least, a close second; Christmas arguably edges it out for first place. Whether this is because of pumpkins, costumes or leftover candy, I am not entirely sure. But she enjoys it enormously nonetheless.

Preparing for Hallowe’en, however, we had no idea what to expect. We have now moved to a small town, that has—at best guess—about a thousand residents. We live on the edge of town. Actually, we live beyond the edge of town. While there are several clusters of houses across about four developments, we live near none of them. Head out of town, across the river, past the cul-de-sac of about a dozen houses, and then you come to us. There is one more house, the golf course, and farmers’ fields beyond that.

So how many trick-or-treaters is it reasonable to expect? If I apply the calculus that I employed as a small child, I wouldn’t darken our doors. Why take the time to go all the way to the spooky old house on the edge of town, when there are so very many more houses, all built together, in the subdivisions? At the same time, it’s Hallowe’en. And we have a spooky old house. What’s not to like about that?

This year's theme: A Clockwork Pumpkin

This year’s theme: A Clockwork Pumpkin

With no understanding of what to expect, therefore, I stocked up as best I could. Meaning I bought about five boxes of chocolate bars, for a sum total of about 132 pieces. That way we would be at least prepared, regardless of what happened. Worse comes to worse, you start giving out three or four pieces per child (which is the other part of candy-collecting-calculus that really needs to be factored in, if you’re a kid).

Pumpkins were carved, candles were lit, candies were waiting, and we waited. And waited. And waited. After a couple of hours, a car appeared in the driveway, with Keelan, Sarah and Wyatt, their boy. Our first trick-or-treater! They were making the rounds of friends and family, and so didn’t stay long, but we were thrilled they made the effort to come out and see us. And give that a) Wyatt was a known quantity, and b) he was our first trick-or-treater, he scored pretty well in the candy department.

From there, we set to wait once more. And wait. And wait. And wait. It turns out that not only was Wyatt our first trick-or-treater, he was also our last trick-or-treater. Or, if you prefer, our only one.

Sadly, Hallowe’en was a bit of a let down. Although it was also a total win in the left-over-candy department.

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