Our little town has a court house, a jail, a post office, and a library. It also has a bank, two "events" venues, five churches (one of which is for sale) and zero traffic lights. Several of the houses were originally log cabins and date back to the 1700's. I have friends who live in two of the log cabin houses and they are always fascinating to be within.
Our little town does Halloween in a big, small-town-America way. (They do Fourth of July fireworks, too but that's for another season.) Between six and six-thirty on October thirty-first, families and children start gathering in the courthouse area on Main Street. Yes, we have a Main Street in our little town, too! The police have blocked off Main Street and before long, hundreds of folks have gathered. Children dart to and fro between grown-ups' legs, wide-eyed babies sit in strollers or are held in arms, staring at the colorful sights. Many grown-ups have donned costumes and everyone is smiling, feeling festive, and expectant of a good bit of candy. While we wait, each family attending has brought a bag of candy to donate. Volunteers gather the bags of candy into large, black garbage bags. Then they rush around town, redistributing the bags of candy to homeowners. This way, none of the homeowners will go broke buying and handing out Halloween candy to the hundreds of trick-or-treaters who have descended onto the town this night. It's a brilliant scheme.
 |
| This was a big puffy dinosaur on the left. I kept seeing this child's costume throughout town and it was a comical sight. As he ran, the head and arms flailed side to side. |
It's granddaughter Violet's first Halloween to go trick-or-treating. The weather is so balmy and beautiful this fall evening that we couldn't wait to meet up and walk around town. We see many folks we know and there's a general visiting going on as we mill about. Finally, the policeman announces on his bull horn that the parade may begin! The crowd begins moving en masse down Main Street. Children break off and run left and right up to houses as it begins to quickly get dark. Houses have their lights on so it's easy to tell which homes are giving out candy. Most folks are sitting outside on their porches, enjoying the warm evening and taking in the sights while they give out candy. Many houses are decorated with lights and pumpkins and spooky spider webs. Violet has a tight grip on her little pumpkin bucket and soon it's filled with several pieces of candy. We continue along a few blocks and stop at friends' homes. At these homes we're given a hug along with our pieces of candy. Steve and Jared see a few old co-workers and stop to chat here and there.
After a while, it begins getting late for the littlest trick-or-treaters. Violet is given her first piece of chocolate at which point she grips her candy-filled pumpkin bucket tighter and won't let go. She has discovered chocolate! As we depart back up Main Street, there's an ambulance being used to block the road. Several volunteers stand around a gurney. As we get closer, we see the gurney is piled with candy. The friendly volunteers scoop up a big handful of candy from the gurney and dump it into Violet's pumpkin bucket. Wowee! What a way to end a perfect Halloween.
 |
| Violet and Audrey |
 |
| There was originally a structure enclosing this chimney. The building was renovated and the fireplaces (there's an upper and lower) are still used outdoors. |
 |
| Lots of movement in the darkness. |
 |
| I loved this scene. This was on a street corner. |
