lioninpunkins

Originally uploaded by oscarcormier.

i think Hallowe’en is my favourite holiday.

now that the curtain is dropping down on October, all the stores can start the mad sparkly dash towards decorating for Christmas, or the holiday season, or whatever we’re calling it in polite company this year so as to avoid excluding or offending anyone…but i personally shall miss the spiderwebs and pumpkins. don’t get me wrong. i like Christmas. but my little Grinch heart doesn’t thrill to the shopping mall crowds, or the weird mix of religion and consumerism that swirls about in the eggnog along with the tinned Bing Crosby carols…in fact, i don’t even like the eggnog. these adult Christmases are always a little bittersweet for me, because – in all their prosaic reality of trying to get things bought and baked and beribboned – they remind me that i am no longer a kid.

whereas Hallowe’en is simple, spooky, tooth-rottingly full of candy, and doesn’t even make me comb my hair. it’s a magical straight line back through sensory memory to childhood. the smell of a candle slowly burning away the inside of a pumpkin makes me feel giddy.

of course, i’d be more giddy if we’d had more than seven trick-or-treaters come to our door…insert many lamentations about how sad i was sitting outside in our porch in the dark hoping small children would happen by. only on Hallowe’en is one allowed to admit to these types of secrets.

but we had our own built in trick-or-treater this year – Oscar the lion. a very overtired, fussy, teething little lion, admittedly, who whimpered more than he roared.

but he was quite lionhearted, nonetheless, and bravely went next door to trick or treat his mama some candy. unfortunately, the clueless neighbours cooing at him apparently saw through the shameless candy-grab ploy on his mother’s part, and we came away empty handed. Oscar has promised to trick them whenever he gets big enough.