A PUMPKIN REFLECTS

The trick or treaters have been thin on the ground for some years now that we are grown and flown. But when I caught wind from my Canadian cousin of the thing you are meant to do to entreat the treaty hunters, I inveigled my sister Angelina to get carving...

She is truly artistic and gleefully carved into that pumpkin, slicing and dicing his teeth with swashbuckling finesse...

I placed him by the foot of the willow tree, under the lantern. Sweets at the ready, inside the door, and I felt sure the calling card would entice, even though my mother was completely without faith - "They won't come," she foretold gloomily, "they never come anymore"...

But within minutes of our sniggering, smirking pumpkin lighting up the street, the doorbell rang!

I've lost count of the number of children who have rung the bell, in droves, others hot on their heels...but my favourite little Halloweeners are the nieces, dressed as pumpkin and bones...

(The doorbell just rang while I was preparing this post - a young girl, not vamped in blood, scars and gore, but looking for someone named Rosie...who apparently definitely lives here... the same address! Her ghost maybe?? Spooky!!)