A Witch, A Spectre, a Skull, and a Snap

(This post was first published to The Dancing Lamb Facebook page on November 4, 2020. It is a tale worth telling twice.)

    Dear readers, this story will read like a tall tale, but every word of it is true. This post has taken over three hours to write. The reason for that will be revealed at end of the post. Sit back and enjoy.

Bear enjoys Halloween as much as we do.

    Halloween is a huge event in Evansville, exceeded only by the Fourth of July. When we first moved here, our neighbor to the east asked if we had taken out a second mortgage yet. Somewhat nonplussed, I asked why. "Halloween," he said, smiling cryptically. That year 300 trick-or-treaters scrambled up and down the porch, and the numbers have only increased since then. We now invite over 600 of them to scale the steps each year.

    Our house has become known as The Witches' House. Every year in the middle of October, we transform the front yard into a witch's paradise. Harvest creates a suitably spooky tableau with the seven-foot high witch, and on Halloween night we light the candles in the lanterns, dress in our witchy best, tuck a flask of hot, mulled wine between us, and settle into our chairs to welcome our guests. With the exception of last year, when there was a substantial snowstorm and biting cold, we never disappoint.

    Evansville is an organized little town, so trick-or-treating lasts from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. - no more, no less. During that brief time, Harvest cackles "Whaddya want? Whaddya want?" as each visitor is offered her or his choice of small toys: bouncy balls, fake spiders, lips with whistles in them, ghoulish fingers, and so on (we figure the kids already have plenty of candy). Anyone dressed as a witch is greeted with, "Oh, sister! I'm so glad you could fly in tonight!" followed by another maniacal cackle. (Harvest only makes this sound on Halloween. I'm not sure if she's capable of it any other day of the year.) Costumes are admired and exclaimed over, and no one is turned away, including the teenagers who arrive well after 6:30 or the kids who ask for an extra treat for absent siblings or friends. No questions asked. My job in all of this pandemonium is to encourage the small and timid up to receive their treat. I am not always successful.

Bones in the cauldron Creepy skulls at the stair rail

    Parents are just as involved as their children in creative costuming. One year an entire group arrived dressed as playing cards. They were milling about, so I wasn't able to determine if they were a royal flush, but they very well might have been.

    Our house is not the only one with an elaborate display in the yard. Main Street is lined with one Victorian house after another, perfect for a spooky Halloween. A block down the street, a life-sized Dracula holding a hangman's noose raises and lowers his arms menacingly. There are any number of graveyards, some of which include skeletons hanging from the eaves which remain clinging to their building throughout the year, and we are positively awash in spider webs, ghosts, and headstones.

The "ghost corgi" standing watch near our front steps

    Then there are the mobile delights. One year a tractor with a flatbed full of hay bales rumbled through the streets offering rides to weary travellers. The Evansville Carriage Company ferries small groups through the historic district with tales of haunted Evansville, and about three years ago, The Spectre arrived. Ambling slowly down the street on a tall, dark horse, The Headless Horseman made two passes through the historic district and disappeared as silently as it had come. The following year, a skeleton horse with a skeletal rider glided by just as silently. It is the icing on the cake.

    Beginning in mid-September this year, endless discussions began about whether, and how, to have some kind of safe trick-or-treating in Evansville. Most of us on Main Street had decided against it, but as time went on, many of us relented, and plans for socially-distanced, creative solutions began to be hatched. Down in the basement, Harvest cut out and painted a four-foot-high Day of the Dead sugar skull. The nose was hollow, allowing ample space for hands to reach in and grab a treat from the basket cleverly mounted behind. The skull was placed just where the walkway up to our house meets the sidewalk. It took some time for the kids to figure it out, but there were no problems once the secret was discovered. There was one little boy who took one look at it, however, and backed away moaning, "I don't like it!"

The amazing sugar skull Harvest built

    Had I not been unexpectedly home this year (more about that in a moment), I might have missed the arrival of The Lady of Death with the Grim Reaper trailing at her heels. Not a sound did she make as she rode her tall, dark horse through town. Even the horse's hooves seemed muffled: I could hear no sound at all. I was determined not to miss the chance for a spectral photograph this year, and as she passed by for the second and last time, I dashed out of the house to get the photo you see below.

    Why, you might wonder, was I at home? This is the part where the Snap comes in.

    Harvest and I were preparing to go to our annual Hallows gathering. Because of COVID, our event was being held in mid-afternoon at a park rather than later in the evening which would have allowed us to enjoy the show in Evansville first before leaving for the gathering.

    While Harvest went to our neighbors and friends to deliver the small sugar skulls she had made before we left, I thought it would be a good idea to go out and feed the chickens. I was wearing my clogs, as usual. Harvest hates my clogs. She has deemed them unsafe, and they are a bit unstable on uneven ground. I suppose I knew that this would eventually catch up with me, and on Halloween it finally did.

    We had moved some pavers near the woodshed around and were still waiting for them to settle. I had a bucket of chicken food in my left hand and stepped on one of these pavers just so in my tippy clogs, and the inevitable occurred. The first thing I heard was the crash of the bucket followed by a tiny, but ominous, *snap* near my right ear where my right hand had reached out to break my fall. Moments later, I muttered, "This is not good. Not good at all," and then decided to lie down in the leaves rather than pass out. I was grateful there was no snow.

    It was some time before I sat up and looked at my wrist. Nothing, other than serious pain, seemed to be amiss. My sister had broken her wrist - twice - and each time it had looked decidedly peculiar. Sprain or break, it was clear that I wasn't going anywhere. Harvest's friend, Connie, was called to sit with me, and I sent Harvest on to the gathering.

    By the time Harvest returned, it seemed pretty clear that the pain was in all the wrong places for a sprain. Off to UW Hospital ER we went. For the next six hours, I spent my time waiting in a room, alternately reading and doing Zen meditation, as I was examined and x-rayed while listening to the intercom announce the arrival of an ambulance followed by yet another ambulance - about two every 45 minutes or so. Poor Harvest, who was not allowed to be with me due to COVID, spent the time watching movies (the ER parking lot has wi-fi, suprisingly), dozing, and waiting for a call from the doctor. To no one's surprise, my wrist was broken - my first break ever - and I was put into a plaster splint to await further treatment by an orthopedic surgeon. Perhaps assuming that I had been up to some early Halloween high-jinx, the members of the ER staff seemed decidedly skeptical about how I had sustained the fracture and kept asking me how I had broken it.

    And thus, we found ourselves back home again just at midnight, the Witching Hour, with no treats, one big trick, and nary a wander through a graveyard. Which is why it has taken me about three hours to write this post, and still nobody believes me that I broke my wrist on Halloween feeding the chickens.

    (Update: There was no need for surgery. I have learned to do all manner of things with one hand during my six weeks in a cast, I have two new pair of shoes which have been approved by Harvest, and both pairs of clogs were consigned to the bin where they made a satisfying thud upon landing.)