Tis the Season: Halloween

I just love Halloween.

I can’t wait till October 31 for the spooky season to begin. I’m starting now. If we have to have a holiday that lasts for weeks and weeks, why can’t it be Halloween? Halloween carols, Halloween cards…but please god no shopping for Halloween presents.

I’ve been trying to figure out what there is about Halloween that enthralls me so. I don’t like blood and gore. I don’t like movies about crazed killers wearing hockey masks. I don’t like chainsaw massacres.

I like mystery.

For me, that’s what Halloween is about. It’s the season of fog. The season of darkness coming early, with damp drizzle that makes you glad to be indoors by the stove. The season to visit graveyards, and think about the past, and wonder if perchance someone is watching over your shoulder as you consider the epitaphs.

And as you walk down a winding country road, are those footsteps you hear coming around the bend?

I don’t want to be terrified into screaming, palpitating horror. No blood, please. I just welcome a little touch of mystery in October, as the mist twines around the trees…

Many thanks to Wells Horton for these magnificent Halloweeny photographs. Check out his others on http://wells-horton.smugmug.com/