I really love Halloween, and in my neighborhood, it’s the occasion for the year’s best block party. Most of the businesses on the commercial street, Cortland Avenue, stay open late and post someone out front to give out candy or, in the case of The Good Life grocery store, apples. Some turn their spaces into haunted houses. Everyone strolls up and down, enjoying each other’s costumes. Many of the nearest residences go all-out too, with fog machines, or in one case, a multistory haunted house that incorporates their backyard treehouse and ends with freshly-made cotton candy for all who want it. I repeat, they own a cotton candy machine. That is a serious investment in neighborhood joy. Another is made by the couple who always project The Nightmare Before Christmas onto the wall of the house next door all evening. They don’t stay inside, but sit out on their front walk, admiring everyone’s costumes and giving out full-size candy bars.
The library always has something great going on such as activities for little kids or a jazz band on their steps. They already have this gorgeous display inside, “Halloween on Bernal Hill,” complete with the iconic swing that’s in the hilltop park.
This neighborhood-wide party is a consolation for the fact that even if we decorate the house and turn our lights on, we won’t get more than a couple of kids trick-or-treating. We are midway down a steep hill, and I think almost everyone squints along the block and decides it’s not worth the climb. School-age kids do go from door to door, but the little ones don’t do anything but Cortland, and we always go early to see them, then home for dinner and a quiet evening.
This year, if anyone does come to the door, Joy will have to greet them, as starting at 6:30, I’ll be the featured speaker in a Tuesday Talk by my friend Jess. She hosts these on Zoom, starting off each one with a presentation by a friend on whatever is their area of expertise. I am going to offer several provocative statements on religion, then do Q&A. It’ll be so much fun to meet her friends.
For Halloween, I am going as Weird Barbie. I think that aside from being a fun costume, it presents opportunities for a family ensemble. But no one in this family has said, “Oh, I’ll be Ken” or “Allan” or “Stereotypical Barbie.” Humph. Of course, they haven’t seen the movie.
I tried to sell Munchkin on Barbenheimer when there was a Barbenheimer Day during her school’s recent Spirit Week. Obviously the intent was for students to be able to dress as Oppenheimer or Barbie, but wouldn’t going as both at once have been awesome?: pink outfit, fedora, tie, pipe? I thought of that for myself, but then my hairdresser, in the midst of greening my hair, suggested Weird Barbie, which I think shows a great sense of humor about her own artistry. Maybe next time I’ll ask her for this ‘do.
Just try to find a fedora in a Goodwill, anyway, much less a pipe. Whereas I found a hot-pink dress immediately. I still have some shopping to do, having tried on sparkly silver sneakers but regretfully returned them to the shelf because they were a full size too big. I won’t be going door-to-door for two hours as in my youth, but still, just walking up the hill and up and down the few blocks of Cortland will raise blisters in the wrong shoes.
The key items are in place, though: pink dress, to which I’ll sew patches; hair gel whose packaging promises it can raise spikes; and face paint for the all-important marker makeup. I need temporary hair color that I couldn’t find at the pharmacy, and, I now realize, black eyeliner I should’ve picked up as long as I was there, but that’s easily acquired. Heaven help me; I haven’t put on eyeliner since I was a teenager; but I’m sure I’ll remember how.
Everything else–tights, shoes–could be managed with things I already own. I can’t do a split, unfortunately, and won’t be able to by Tuesday or by Halloween 2027, for that matter. If you don’t know why this is significant, watch the movie already. It’s really good!
Now, to decorate the house. It’s going to be minimal, because the painters will be coming on the 31st to power-wash the whole front of the house, and decorating our entryway as we have done in the past is out of the question. I have a plan, though. Pictures to follow, if we follow through.
Sermons in Stones 
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