Halloween Love Story

Countdown to Halloween has started, and I was fortunate enough to find it in time to participate this year. It's going to be difficult to tear myself away from all the participants' blogs, but if I don't, there'll be nothing to post.

Mr. Macabre posted a question several days ago, dealing with spousal support for Halloween enthusiasts. As I stated there, hubby indulges me, but doesn't really get into it all, probably due to his disabilities.  But there was a time....

In the late 1960s (probably before most of you were born, children), DH was a youth and music minister of a Baptist church in Alabama, where we both grew up.  I had met him not long before my 15th birthday, when he was a student at a local University and came to help out one of his fellow students  (my choir director) by singing in the youth choir. I was hopelessly smitten, but as there was a 4-year age difference, our friendship was more of a sibling-type relationship.

My senior year in high school, DH planned Halloween "socials" for 3 different church youth groups, and recruited two of his cousins and me to help. One of them, Steve, was really into theater and the arts, and did a great job transforming DH, Bill, himself and me into a vampire, corpse, wolf-man, and lady vampire, respectively.  I remember it took Steve hours to individually apply clumps of hair to his face and hands.

DH wrote the script for us, and though the storyline is long since forgotten, what I do remember is a lot of teeth-baring and discord among the characters, and some improvisation when we couldn't remember our lines.  After the final social, when we weren't quite ready to give it all up, we drove around awhile, scaring other drivers at stoplights (I told you Steve was good) and stopping at a 7-11 for some Slurpies and photos by the store's proprietor.

Within 2 years we were dating, and in 1971, I married this blue-eyed, dimpled vampire.  Our first Halloween, he positioned the huge stereo speakers out in the bushes by the front porch and played the only 2 record albums of spooky sound effects we owned.  We turned off all the lights in the house, and I sat just inside the open door, dressed all in white, under the rays of the blacklight, beckoning ToTs to come, come.  The shivering was real--it was COLD that night--and very few children ventured up the sidewalk, let alone came to the porch for candy.

Years passed, we worked, moved, and moved, and moved across the country and back again, endured a catastrophic illness and financial quagmires, and Halloween pranks and events took a back seat to trick-or-treating with our daughter.

Now we are older, still loving scary movies, living in a great neighborhood with increasing numbers of children, and there's a plethora of information and how-tos out there.  Halloween has ascended to a whole new level of technique, finesse and fright, and it's exciting to discover and try them. DH humors me and even makes a suggestion now and then.  I think there may still be a bit of vampire lurking behind those blue eyes and dimples...