Wow, what a weekend.

It was a triple-whammy weekend.

Halloween. Not my favorite holiday, but kind of a festive blip on the radar nonetheless. At least it’s an excuse to have candy in the house.

Falling back. Yeah, I know it means an extra hour of sleep. But what it mostly means is DARK by 5:15. I don’t care if it’s light out in the morning. I’m wide awake in the morning. But as of yesterday, I am now completely non-functional by dinnertime.

Royals take the crown in an AWESOME twelfth inning. I snoozed through the 11th, but was wide awake for that ending. The last (and only other) time our home team won the series was just a few weeks before my wedding. Wow.

And now, time to go home to a) get some exercise to counteract the effects of that Halloween candy, b) do a few tasks before the sunlight reaches an angle that tells my body and mind to shut down for the day and c) watch Game 5 highlights yet again.

It’s really here!

Fall, that is, in all its glory. And I almost missed the best of it. Too sick last week to get out and do my usual neighborhood walk, this is what I nearly missed out on:

Thank goodness it was still this beautiful yesterday when I finally got out again.

And another sign of the season: My entry in the staff pumpkin decorating contest, winner to be determined by votes at our annual Halloween party tomorrow evening.

With several serious overachievers on staff, I’m unlikely to win the contest. But as the only prize is getting to choose where we go for our next staff lunch, we all win anyway.

Loving this season!

Halloween quandary.

This afternoon I got a phone call from someone I haven’t seen in a year, inviting The Husband and me to a grown-ups only Halloween party being hosted by parents we used to work with closely in the high school choir and theater booster club. No costumes required, lots of people we like and rarely see any more. And it threw me into a tailspin.

I mean, what’s a SAD-riddled introvert to do?

I’m thrilled to be remembered and included. As the Husband remarked when I told him about the invitation, “Wow, I’ve never been one of the cool kids before. I’m flattered.” I know for a fact that I would enjoy seeing most of these people again.

And yet, I also know myself too well. If I accept the invitation, it will feel great now. And the closer we get to Halloween, the more I will kick myself. By the 31st I’ll be pouting around the house, sick to my stomach because I have to a) wear makeup and nice clothes on a Saturday, b) stay awake and alert until the party starts at 9:00 pm (this time of year I’m in my pajamas the minute the sun goes down), and c) force myself into a situation where I have to make conversation with people outside my family.

But I think I’m going to say yes. The Husband and I talked it over. He gets all my reservations and will support me either way. But even giving that “yes” is hard for me. Like many introverts, making a phone call is, for me, like walking on broken glass. Doesn’t help that the woman issuing the invitation is a blabber puss. A phone call to her is a half-hour commitment. If only I can catch her when she can’t pick up the phone so I can just leave a voice mail.

Sheesh. All this over a lovely invitation. Sometimes being an introvert is a real curse.

Now THAT’S scary.

Spent six hours yesterday driving back and forth to see a three-hour production of Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” in which The Boy played in the chorus. But that’s not the scary part. Actually, it was bliss for me.

This self-created newspaper article is his contribution to the “scary door decoration” contest being held on his dorm floor. If you’ve heard anything about Kansas politics, you’ll know that if our current governor is reelected on Tuesday, that will certainly be more frightening than anything you might have seen on Halloween. Love that kid.

Halloween: Is it good for the children?

Resolved: The proliferation of nightmarish Halloween yard displays is damaging and antisocial and should be strictly regulated by city ordinances.

I’ve always been a “Dear Abby” reader, largely because it’s fascinating to read the wildly varying extremes of the human condition that people write in about. Yesterday’s “Dear Abby” column included a letter from a mom whose young child was terrified by the annual repulsive display in the yard of a next door neighbor – skeletons, “dead” bodies, bloody knives…I’m sure you’ve seen it. We have more and more of them in our neighborhood every year.

A summary of “Abby’s” reply to the writer : “You can’t protect your child forever. Just tell him it’s all meant in the spirit of fun and it isn’t real.”

I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin carving personally – too messy for my tastes – but at least this jack -o’-lantern is inoffensive.

Obviously “Abby” has never had or known a child with a sensitive nature. You can’t just give a terrified child a tired platitude and call it good.

I have never been a molly-coddling parent. But I know my children well, and I have always believed it’s my job to recognize their deep needs and respond to them appropriately. We have one child who was (and honestly, still is) bone-deep terrified of the type of Halloween displays in question. Dismissive words from me along the lines of “it’s just a joke, get over it” would simply have told her that her needs are not important to me.

Then, too, childhood education and development have been an important part of my life’s work. I am absolutely convinced that, as a community, we must accept the responsibility to monitor anything we allow children to ingest – from food to video games to television ads to horrific yard displays. Don’t try to give me any crappy arguments against a “nanny state.” If we are to create a healthy, productive society, we must fight for the best for our youngest members. If that means regulating businesses, neighbors, and parents who have hideously bad judgement when it comes to the way they affect children’s healthy development, then so be it.

Grisly Halloween yard displays are a symptom of that kind of hideously bad judgement, as are violent video games, worship of posturing, macho sports figures, and ratings creep in movies. When our children are fed that kind of diet, how can we be surprised when they exhibit ugly, violent, or antisocial behavior?

It’s become almost cliche, but the question “Is it good for the children?” should be the yardstick by which we measure anything out there that our children might consume.

Happy – NOT scary – Halloween!

Halloween is a much quieter affair as children grow up. The quest for the perfect costume is a thing of the past.  I can get away without the dreaded carving of the pumpkins – surely a ritual belonging to one of Dante’s circles of hell, due to its sticky, globby mess.  No more freezing, wet traipses through the neighborhood, extorting nutritionally bankrupt treats from good-natured homeowners.

The one thing I miss the least from those old days of children and Halloween is the sheer terror produced in Middle Sister EVERY SINGLE DAY of October. I’ve never understood why so many people find it hilarious to create hideous graveyard scenes in their front yards – and it seems to get more and more common every year.

An inoffensive Halloween decoration. Is that so difficult?

There was one particular house, along the only walk-able route to our elementary school, that made October a nightmare for our family.  The zombies, bloody, severed arms and legs, and hanged bodies in the display at that house frightened Middle Sister so horribly that she arrived at school shaking uncontrollably and crying. Every single October for years.  We tried walking on the other side of the street, carrying an umbrella to shield her as we passed. No good. We tried driving to school. Still too scared. In the end we had to take a circuitous drive through the neighborhood, carefully avoiding THAT HOUSE all month.

Ten years out of elementary school, I’m still on “yard watch” for Middle Sister. There are three repulsive houses on the walking route we like to take when we exercise together. There’s another house on the way to our favorite book store with an ax-murderer scene graphically portrayed on the front lawn.  Every trip away from home finds me saying, “Don’t look to the left,” or “Close your eyes for a moment.”

These kinds of displays just make me angry. They are, quite simply, juvenile and thoughtless. Why would anyone intentionally create something in a public space that is ugly, frightening, and cruel, and which can potentially damage/terrify young (and not so young) people?

Here’s a question I would suggest people ask themselves before creating such a display: Would you force a young child watch a movie like “Nightmare on Elm Street” or “Texas Chain Saw Massacre?” Because if you’re re-creating a similar scene in your front yard, you’re forcing every child who passes your house to be exposed to the same type of inappropriate content.  It’s no more socially acceptable than public profanity or a pornographic photo on a billboard.

In other words, if you’re inclined to put up a display like that, how about instead you try behaving like a mature, responsible adult?