Day 326 Tricks and Treats

October 31, 2015

(If we live with an open and grateful attitude, every day will bring a gift. This is one of 365 gifts during the year I turned 70.)

Twelve-year-old Alexander provided a treat for his neighbors with his haunted driveway. Above are two scenes from his creation.

When I was a child, my mother did not allow my sisters and me to go from house to house trick-or-treating. She said she didn’t want us begging at our neighbors’ homes. I think she was also afraid of unknown dangers. However, we were allowed to go to a select few homes of family and friends. Our shopping bags were filled with visits to eight houses. Although her daughters did not go around the neighborhood, our mother often made homemade treats for those who came to our house—caramel apples on a stick, brownies, rice crispy treats. And if she thought the kids were too old (more than 14), she admonished them for acting like little children and refused to give them any treats.

I always loved dressing up for Halloween but not in princess costumes. I liked to dress up as a hobo (politically incorrect to some these days) so people wouldn’t recognize me. Even as an adult, when Halloween fell on the meeting date of the Baltimore Camera Club years ago, I attended as a ghost and left with no one the wiser, except one friend who was in on it. 

Tonight, we had only a few kids knock on our door and we answered—David as a monster and me as a witch. When the knocks stopped, we checked out the other end of our neighborhood and found a haunted scene in a driveway. We learned it was created by a twelve-year-old boy, Alexander. He used tricks of animations, fog, and sounds— everything to make it fun for anyone who stopped by. As a retired 7^th-grade teacher, I was amazed at his ingenuity. His display was so well planned and professional that it is easy to foresee a creative career in his future. Although everyone who stopped by his house could get a candy treat, the real treat was this amazing kid-built spooky experience.

My gift today is a haunted driveway.

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> Day 327: When Will Bob Get Naked?


You can find links to my other posts on this project here:
http://bjschupp.blogspot.com/2014/12/365-gifts.html