Late Report on Halloweeen

This was our first Massachusetts Halloween. Our old house, on Pumpkin Street, was a natural draw. Fortunately, we had no windows that faced the street and it was easy to pretend to not be at home. That's not the case here. Combine that with the fact that the town collected donations brought us candy to distribute to the kids and we really had no choice but to participate in Halloween.

Being at the town center, we'd been warned that we might expect as many as 200 trick-or-treaters. Halloween being on a Saturday threw a wrinkle into things. It might have meant an increase but we only saw about 60 trick-or-treaters. The kids were probably at parties or traveled to other towns - they weren't here.

Trick-or-treating was from 5-7pm with a parade to follow at 7pm. We closed up at 7pm and went up to the town square to watch the start of the parade. We'd been told that the entire town participates in the parade. The Fire Department led the parade and the police department followed up. In between, there were 4 or 5 small children with their parents. We cheered them on as they went past and then went back home.

We had a ton of candy left over that, through Briar, we were able to donate to charity.

Last night, we attended a dinner party at one of our neighbor's home. This party is an annual tradition and usually includes a bonfire where a cutout of a witch is burned (must be a Massachusetts thing). It's been dry and it was pretty windy yesterday so the bonfire was cancelled. We had a nice visit with our neighbors, some of whom we hadn't met before.

It's been interesting to learn what we can see when the leaves are gone. Our lot abuts nearly every other lot on our block. We couldn't see any of them before but we can now see the silhouettes of almost every house on the block through the woods. The local church steeple seemed far away but, all of a sudden, it towers. We can even see the ancient tombstones silhouetted across the crest of the fill.

I've already mentioned the stone wall that we've discovered across the back of the property. I was seated next to the lady that we bought the house from at the dinner party and she told me that the wall goes all the way around the property. I've been thinking about building a greenhouse in the brush area at the back of the lawn. The prior owner told me that, come springtime, we'll see that there's a large concrete slab back in that area (it used to be a goat shed). It might provide a perfect foundation for the greenhouse.

-JC-