HALLOWEEN LOVING GRAMPS Gramps hasn't always been as funny as he currently is. At one time he was very, very scary. He continues to be scary once a year on one of his favorite holidays.You see, Gramps never outgrew his love for Halloween, not at ten years old, not at twenty years old, not at thirty years old and not at forty years old. Having been influence by him, our oldest son and his friends observed the holiday all year long in our basement with a continuing, all year long spook house. Regrettably they used our youngest son as their first victim in testing their ingenious work. Still to this day our youngest son hates scary movies.Even today in his early seventies, Gramps still dresses up for one of his favorite days of the year. Now he's a mummy and he stands in the front yard in the middle of elaborate holiday decorations with a blazing fire in a fire pit behind him.As a matter of fact, currently I have to dress up like a cute black kitty cat so I can soothe the fears of the frantic children when they get a glimpse of the scary mummy. I have to encourage them on toward the chocolate candy bars that the mummy passes out while they resist their urges to run the other way in fear.Last year I got insulted by a snippy smart mouthed preteen girl who said to me, after I had spent hours putting on my cute black kitty cat makeup, black cat ears anchored to a head band, black shirt and pants, "Are you a black cat again? When are you going to change your costume?" I could have tucked my long fake black cat tail between my legs and cowardly walked into the house, but I wasn't going to let an insult ruin my holiday. She didn't say one nasty word to the mummy about his costume being outdated, and he's been a mummy for 15 years.For years Gramps has had a reputation in town for being very scary with several generations of people. In the late 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s he used to dress in my full length black evening cape, my shoulder length flowing dark brown wig and a tall witch's hat. Being the artist that he is, he always created huge fake warts out of clay, painted them dark brown and temporarily glued them to his nose. He even put long straight black hairs growing out of the warts. He was ug-ug-ugly in that costume.On every Halloween evening during those early years he took up residence on the front porch of our previous house, stirring a concoction in a huge vat that was boiling from dry ice. It looked like witches brew. As long as our black cat (creatively named Blackie) cooperated, Gramps cradled the cat in his left arm. He was very, very frightening. We always had scary organ music accompanied by screams playing on the outside loud speakers, the sounds originating from the hi-fi in the house. This was a typical Halloween at our Boston Street house.Three of our regular trick or treating customers in those years were children of friends of ours. They always warily approached our porch, urged on by their big protective daddy, to collect their candy. Year after year they came for their frightening experience.The father of the children told us that the children always refused to walk on or ride their bikes down, "The street where the witch lives."Years later, one of those children became a pediatrician, one an attorney and one an educator. It continues to be embarrassing to be at a fancy party and hear our friend remark to his adult professional children, "Do you remember who this man is?" They still say, "Yes. He's the witch who lived on Boston Street." Then they go on and tell how Gramps in his witch's costume cost them lots of hours of sleep and added to their childhood fears.Gramps, I'm thinking about using that as part of your obituary when the time comes, "He will always be remembered as the witch who lived on Boston Street."Do you double dare me?
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