For years, Halloween was my official favorite holiday.
Every Halloween, about 4:00 in the afternoon — as the sky began to darken and the wind grew chilly — my Dad would start decorating the house. He would carve a pumpkin — a real one — and plant a candle inside. He would put a red bulb in the porch light. Using nothing more than the backyard tetherball and a sheet, he would cobble together a pop-up ghost I could summon from a basket with the yank of a cleverly concealed length of twine.
* * * * *
His triumph — the effect that, one year, left our yard littered with candy bags dropped by terrorized trick-o’-treaters — was The Dummy.
Today, trick-o’-treaters — what few there are — pretty much stick to their neighborhoods and get their trick-o’-treating over with well before dark. Back then, though, trick-o’-treating didn’t start before nightfall … and the huge roving gangs of trick’-o’-treaters ranged far and wide. When a house was doing something remarkable, word got out. Savvy people would tell their friends, and everyone would loop back around to the especially scary places.
One year, at the beginning of the night, Dad took some of my old clothes, stuffed them with other clothes, topped the plump body off with a stuffed over-the-head rubber mask, and created The Dummy. When I first saw it, I was disappointed and dubious. This was this year’s big scare? It looked entirely fake.
But then Dad took apart our cheap home intercom system, concealed a speaker in the Dummy’s chest and connected hidden wires to a microphone in our living room. When the first trick-o’-treaters stepped onto the porch, they quickly concluded that The Dummy was just a Dummy … and then Dad flicked on the microphone and delivered a blood-curdling scream.
Trick-o’-treaters scattered like flushed quail, scattering candy in all directions.
I loved it. For the next hour, we pulled the trick again and again … until, at about 7:30, Dad turned to me and said, “Go take down The Dummy.”
I couldn’t believe he was pulling the plug on such an effective scare! I complained about it, but I went out to the porch and brought The Dummy inside.
“Now,” Dad said. “Put The Dummy’s clothes on.”
In a flash, I was dressed in The Dummy’s baggy clothes, and Dad was stuffing the arms and legs, making me look less like a boy and more like The Dummy. With the mask pulled down over my head, I plopped down in The Dummy’s chair on the porch, slouching to one side, just as the stuffed version had.
Not long after, the first of the returning trick-‘o-treaters came, bringing their friends. The boldest of these returnees came up on the porch, pointed to me, and said, loudly to the shy newcomers, “It’s got a speaker in it, but it’s just a dummy.” To prove his point, he gave me a poke.
I jumped up. I raised my arms. I screamed, “WHO’S THE DUMMY NOW?!?!”
Kids twice my age fled in terror.
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That Halloween was almost forty years ago, but in my memory, those events are as bright and vivid as ever.
This Halloween, we will have trick-o’-treaters. They sign up in the lobby of our building, politely agreeing to come between 6:00 and 7:00. We have been told they will be very young — toddlers, mostly — and that they will only come to the doors of owners who consent to host them. Given their tender ages, scariness is discouraged.
Even so, Clyde — knowing today is special for me — signed us up … and so, tonight, I’ll be answering the door, handing out candy.
It will be bittersweet.
Years ago, the ancients taught that tonight, on what we call Halloween night, the layer of separation between our world and the next becomes a thin and permeable as it can ever be. Ghosts and departed spirits take advantage of this, roaming freely, visiting favorite haunts, touching base with the living.
Maybe that’s why, on Halloween, Dad is more on my mind than ever. What a remarkable man he was — so clever, so inventive, so quiet, so patient. He did more with a sheet and some twine than most folks can do with a yard full of jiggly, inflatable mass-produced goblins.
I love him. I miss him.
Trick or treat, Dad. Trick or treat.
As the father of two children who are not that much younger than we were as high school friends, I hope I am creating the kind of memories for them that your dad created for you that long ago Halloween night. Also, your story made me think that I wish I had gotten to know your dad better when I came out to your house to visit. (But then again, I guess that is the difference between the forty-four year old version of me and the sixteen year old model.)
I remember your Dad as being a most kind, gentle man. I was able to visit him not long before he passed away, and his smile was still the most illuminating factor in the room. No wonder he was able to capture the beauty in every photograph he ever took, regardless of the subject.
Your Halloween story brought tears to my eyes…had to call mom and warn her not to read your page at work today, as sentimental as she is about family…she’ll be a blubbering idiot.
To make a difference in the life of a child..there is not greater calling. Your dad was a kind soul. Too often the good ones do in fact, die too young.
Mark, my eyes filled with tears as I read your article. Uncle Mac was the kindest and most gentle man I have known. Thank you for sharing your beautiful memory. I love you.