Spooky!

By G. E. Shuman


It is a distant memory, cold and old, dusted off now as a long-neglected, rediscovered book might be. It matters, somehow, that this nearly-forgotten evening happened within a mid-nineteen-sixties year. Perhaps it could be that the late autumn wind cooled and creaked the leafless, lifeless-looking trees even more then than now; again, somehow. Or, perhaps it is only because those October thirty-firsts were actually spookier then, at least to the one whose memory of the night it is. Those Halloweens contained no costumes of bleeding skulls or vividly maimed souls. They were, simply, or perhaps, not so simply, ghostly, hauntingly spooky nights.

On this one night, dusk, as dust, settled slowly upon the small New England town of the boy’s youth. Supper had been a hurried affair, gobbled by giggling goblins anxious to get out into the night. Low voices and footsteps of other spooks were already upon the steps; knocks and bone-chilling knob-rattling had already begun at the front door.

The boy of ten or so was more than ready to go out. By accident or plan, his siblings had already slipped into the night without him. He was very alone; at least he hoped he was alone, as he ventured into the much too chilly night air. The cold breeze stung his eyes as he peered through the rubbery-odored mask of his costume. He began the long walk through the frozen-dead, musty-smelling leaves covering the sidewalk. The youth hurried past the frightful row of thick and dark, moonlit-maples along the way. He was very afraid that the dry crunch of death in those old leaves would alert of his presence whatever ghoul or ghost might be lurking behind one of those trees. As he walked on in the increasingly-inky black, he dared not peek even slightly around any of those trees. It was a sure thing that not EVERY roadside tree hid some witch or ghastly ghoul, but the boy knew that he was certain to pick the one which did, if he were to dare to look.

By sheer will, or by chance, the youth succeeded in surpassing the haunted trees, and successfully trick-or-treated at many houses on the street. Every inch of the way he thought about the one house he dreaded visiting most; the house of the witchy-looking old lady. Sure, she seemed kind in the daytime, but you didn’t see her humped old back or the wrinkly look in her eyes in the daytime. Her house was cold as a tomb, at least, such was her porch, at night and in late October. The boy knew this well from the year before, but that year he had been with his brothers and sisters. As he walked, the scuffing of every step seemed to taunt him with the words: Every… witch… awaits… the child… who comes… alone…

The boy’s small hands were nearly freezing by the time he reached the old lady’s small dark house far down the street. He managed to climb to the top of the worn old steps. He stood there a moment, and then worked up enough courage to open the narrow door which entered onto the witch’s small, windowed porch. The rusty door spring, worn to its own insanity by countless other small boys who were fools enough to enter here, screeched a hateful, taunting announcement of the boy’s arrival. This it repeated, mocking its original scream, as the door slammed tightly shut, between the lad and the world outside.

The long, enclosed tomb of a porch offered no relief from the cold, but some little relief from the night wind. The only light therein was that of a maddening, perfectly-placed jack-o-lantern which hideously smiled up at the boy from the floor, at the farthest corner of the room. The porch exuded the sooty-sweet smell of that candle-lit carved pumpkin. This aroma mingled with that of crisp, cold Macintosh apples which filled a wooden crate at one wall. “What could possibly be the use of cold apples to a witch?” The boy briefly pondered.

The one who disguised herself as a regular, kind old lady during the daytime was very cunning indeed. Her trap for little boys was a porch table full of the biggest and best treats in the town. Those very famous treats were the single reason the boy was even on this terrifying porch. There was a tray which held beautiful candied apples and another laden with huge, wax-paper-wrapped popcorn balls. A bowl between them overflowed with candy corn; the boy’s favorite. Thoughts of poison apples and boiling cauldrons momentarily filled the child. He then nervously picked his treat, and got it safely into the candy-stuffed pillow case he carried. Hearing the nighttime witch walking across her kitchen floor toward the door to the porch, he headed out, past the screeching door, down the steps, and toward home. If she had ever invited any little boy into her home, that boy certainly had never come back out. This boy, that night, had, somehow, survived another visit to that house. He had gotten away with the biggest popcorn ball of all! His only fear then was in getting past the street-side ghouls that certainly stared at him from behind some of those huge old maples. But, the horror was, behind which ones?

Yes, Halloween was different in the nineteen sixties, before the age of sugar and plastic holidays. There was something hauntingly powerful about the cheap paper cutouts, cheesy cardboard skeletons and black and orange streamers of those years. Fold-out paper pumpkins and eerie (and probably dangerous) cardboard candleholders lit our yards. Homemade, totally safe treats filled pillow cases and paper bags. Those bags belonging to night-prowling, costumed, youthful vagabonds, whose parents had no fear at all that they would not return home safely. Halloween nights were ones of simple, frightful fun. Cartoon ghosts and goblins, fake witches and funny Frankenstein monsters were all that stalked the innocent imaginations of children then. True evil had nothing to do with those nights at all.

The ghouls of Halloweens long-past may live only in aging, dusty memories, but the dark and distant nineteen-sixties Halloween you just read about really did happen. At least, that’s how this old trick-or-treater remembers it.

Aren’t You Glad I’m Not Your Dad?

(A Satirical, Seemingly, Socially Unacceptable Column)
By G. E. Shuman

I was in line at a department store the other day, and heard, and then saw a very distraught young mother behind me demonstrating to her toddler son that she knew how to count. “One… Two… Three…,” the mom spoke, slowly and sternly. I was very proud that the lady could count, and nearly clapped for her when she finished at the number three. Unfortunately for the mom, the child seemed less impressed than I by his mother’s performance. By his reaction, or lack of one, I was fairly certain he had heard his mom count to three many times before. I was also pretty sure his mom meant no warning of possible retribution for some misdeed the child had recently committed. If she had, the effort had exactly the same effect on him as it did on her. Both seemed to dismiss the counting completely, and move on to other things, immediately after she had finished. Personally, I felt that the counting would have been more effective if mom had learned to count backward from three to zero. Everyone who has ever seen a time bomb counting down to zero on TV knows that ‘zero’ is when something actually happens. At zero you run out of luck, and chances, and numbers.

It seems that things have lately become very twisted up in our world. I wonder, and I mean this sincerely, why we have put so much stock and confidence in the judgment of the little angels God has blessed our families with. Why do we even consult small children in matters of their own behavior? That responsibility is quite a load to burden them with. Don’t you agree? Besides this, in my opinion, reasoning with some toddler about why he bit a hunk out of the daycare worker’s leg is like asking a bank robber to tell you why he ‘did it’. In either case you are likely to get nothing more than scowls and shrugging shoulders in response. In my opinion, again, rewarding that toddler with praise for acting like a human being for the following few minutes is like telling the bank robber that, if he tells you he is sorry, he can keep the loot. In either case, it just seems like little in the way of a deterrent for the future. In the situation of the poor counting mother mentioned earlier, I have considered that counting to three may work a little, but not on the child. It does help the mom cool down and divert any thoughts of strangulation or suicide, and that result alone is of great worth. For the child, parental counting seems to do no more than provide him with a few valuable seconds to escape.

I have observed that many elementary schools seem to operate the same way as do the counting moms of the world. I realize that actual punishment, or even the mention thereof, is quite taboo in the public arena, but now even the word discipline is looked down upon. Please remind me? We are getting soft on all of this for what reason? Oh yes, to protect the child’s self esteem. Okay… as long as it’s for a good reason. When I was a child, a teacher would tell you, in no kind voice, to: “Sit in that corner ‘til you straighten up!” You could almost hear the unspoken words: “You little Brat!” emanating from her beet-red face. That was so cool! These days, sitting in the corner at school, or sitting still anywhere is often referred to as a ‘time out’ for the child. My question is a simple one: “Time out for WHAT?” Furthermore, “Sit still and behave yourself!” (A phrase that worked pretty well in my day) is now: “Remember Sweetie, we need to make good choices.” Good choices? WHAT good choices? “Let’s see…” thinks the child. “Next time… will I throw another rock at the girl on the playground, or use a baseball bat? I need to make a good choice.”

I also seem to remember that, back in the day, and this was way before anyone actually used the phrase “back in the day”, little terrorists, I mean sweet little children with discipline ‘issues’, would, (I hate that word ‘issues’. I think that word alone is causing me some issues.) be sent to the principal’s office. When I was young the only thing worse than going to the principal’s office was what would happen after I got home from school that day. No, my parents didn’t hate me. In fact, they loved me enough to discipline me. How strange. I think those mean folks might have even used the word punish from time to time. For some reason, they didn’t have to use the word or the punishment often.

I do like the fact that going to the principal’s office, in most public schools, has gone the way of the dinosaur. Those principals are much too busy working on social models to worry about the behavioral training of the next generation to lead our country. Kids are now sent to opportunity rooms, and planning rooms. I once actually asked a grammar school teacher what happened in those rooms. I asked what kind of torture was inflicted on those kids, in those rooms, to make them hate going there so much. Her response was, seriously, that the kids hate those rooms because they are made to do their work in there. My goodness… talk about cruel and unusual punishment! My unspoken reply was that I would think those rooms would be unnecessary if the little darlings were made to do their work in the classroom. But that’s just me, and I could be wrong. Every person bent on destruction certainly requires an opportunity to plan.

I realize that I, like the trips to the principal’s office, will soon go the way of the dinosaur. To some who have just read this column that may seem like a wonderful thing. Before I go that way, I would like to offer just one more, tiny, seemingly, socially unacceptable observation. It is this. I know that when I was young, moms didn’t count to three in public. They didn’t need to, as everyone assumed they could probably count even higher than that if they wanted to. Also, back then, there seemed to be fewer unruly children in the schools. This could be some cosmic coincidence, and probably is. We were just so lucky back then. Or, it could be because teachers, as a rule, as rulers of the class, even used rulers to stop unruliness-prone children from actually repeating unruly acts. How medieval! Kids were simply expected to behave well at home and at school, and were not coddled and cuddled every time they made a good choice, and refrained from maiming anybody that entire day. Good choices were the rule, not the exception.

I leave you with the wise words of the well-known Christian family psychologist, Dr. James Dobson: “If your child is looking for a fight, don’t disappoint him.” Now, aren’t you glad I’m not your dad?