The home-carved jack-o-lantern in the window, the Halloween decoration of the olden days, does not hold a candle to the over-the-top home and yard displays that have once again popped up around the city in anticipation of visiting ghouls and goblins.
There is still a bit of time to hop in the car with the family to tour the city to see just what is percolating for Thursday’s night of fun and fears. Some of the displays are creepy in their simplicity. Others are spooktacular with lights and sound effects that would surely confuse any alien visitors who happen to stop in the city.
Halloween in the country in my growing-up years was much simpler. Costumes were usually homemade and had been recycled through several siblings and even friends and families. Because there were so few of us roaming the streets of our village and because our voices were known to every resident, it was not difficult to figure out the names of the cowboy, ballerina, witch, ghost and even the guy who only wore a mask, much like the Lone Ranger.
I do wonder what my mother did with the Halloween bedsheet I used several times to attend school parties as the community ghost. There were holes cut out for the eyes, nose and mouth. Eyebrows were drawn on with coloured pencils. And the mouth was designed to curl up or down, changeable each year for variety’s sake.
That bedsheet was one-size-fits-all and saved the bother of trying to be creative each year to produce the most interesting costume. It was hardly worth the effort for such a short parade at the school and then the after-dark jaunt from house to house.
I do recall being upset one year when my Mother was one of the costume judges for the school parade and she voted to award the best costume prize to someone else. I can understand her reasoning now, but back then it was a betrayal of extraordinary proportion. I and the other losers did win a participation ribbon.
I wonder now if that bedsheet got turned into pillowcases and dish towels for my hope chest. Mom would not have wasted one scrap of that ghostly bed covering.
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The tiny girl loudly made her opposition known to having a needle or a “tiny poke” in her arm. She was not shy about expressing her dislike for needles and the adults nearby heard her objection loud and clear.
While we listened to her cries and pleas, the adult in us thanked her quietly for taking our attention off what was happening to our arms: a needle in the left for flu and one in the right for the COVID booster.
There are few among us who don’t think back to our childhoods when it came time for the regular shots that would stop us from catching measles and other childhood diseases.
I don’t recall the school nurses who came to the classroom ever calling the needle a “tiny poke.” I’m not sure they even spoke to us, except to ensure themselves of our identities. And they certainly didn’t offer a sticker, a fancy Bandaid or a sucker to help alleviate our pain.
Then again, none among us, that I recall, ever gave in to the desire to shed a few tears over being pierced for our good health. That would have been a blemish on our heroism.
To add insult to my annual injury, the nurse would show up on our family’s doorstep to share our lunch. That might have happened because of my dad being on the school board and he felt he had to be neighbourly. Or maybe our family got paid to provide her lunch.
Upon reflection I would have to say the shot against childhood diseases wasn’t 100 per cent effective: I recall measles, mumps on one side, chicken pox, mumps on another side and then mumps on both sides.
Maybe it was too much to expect from “a tiny poke.”
Joyce Walter can be reached at [email protected]
