Pennsylvania may not be as vibrant in autumn as New England, where there seem to be more leaves of truly bright reds and yellow-gold, but it is till awesome.
Simply walking through neighborhoods or driving to the store takes us past glorious reds, golds, oranges, maroons and greens of autumn.
The many colonial homes and stone churches add uniquely Philadelphia charm.
Halloween marks the transition from the harvest of fall to the hybernating season winter, although in Pennsyvlania at least we still have just as many leaves on trees as on the ground, which may not be true without attention by residents and municipalities to the task of removing fallen leaves.
Celtic origins of Halloween celebrated this transition of the seasons as "Samhain." Other ancient peoples and Romans held similar festivities, holding some special reverence for whatever they called Halloween as a special time when spirits from the other side could speak to the living. They wore animal heads and other costumes.
Christianity, like the Roman Empire, regularly incorporated pagan holidays. They adopted the idea of a special day for spirits on November 1 called "All Hallows Day," as in "hallowed be thy name." It was for departed saints. Just as we have Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve, they called October 31 All Hallows' Eve, which morphed into Halloween.
I say that the words morphed but actually it was the entire English vocabulary that has transitioned to the point where we would no longer be able to understand earlier versions of English, much less whatever that language the peoples of the first millenium spoke in what what we call England.
The American take on this holiday has made Halloween a time for children and many adults to dress up in scary costumes, though I must say that in our family, we generally dressed more as heroes, princesses and loveable characters.
For example, my favorite costume as a boy was Zorro, while Jay's was probably Red Ranger from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
Gina loved dressing up like Dale Evans, but her favorite costume was Tweety Bird. I clearly remember Amy as Madelline or Princess Jasmine, costumes that actually had been used in dance recitals.
I think of Gina and my nephew Brooks in the incredible Care Bear costumes my sister Darlene made for them, but she always regrets that we wouldn't let her wear her Hawaiian girl outfit the next year to trick or treat because we deemed it too cold.
This year, Emma went the scary route, dressed up to be Killua, an Anime assassin, complete with blood splatter on his face. Yes, I said his. Killua is a boy, although Emma is such a beautiful girl that she looked more like a fashion model.
Emma wanted to wear shorts, and I was supportive of that before remembering just how much the temperature can drop during that last week of October. Another sobering realization for me was just how grown-up Emma looked, which gives me a different type of concern for a tween-ager and soon-to-be teenager.
On Halloween, I reveresed my prior endorsement of shorts to support her mother Gina's wise counsel to wear leggings and carry a sweat shirt, but Emma had made up her mind. Perhaps memories of not being able to be that Hula Girl swayed her mother's final decision, although Gina and Laszlo usually let Emma decide for herself. That's what she did: not just shorts, but short shorts.
She lived to tell the tale, which included trick-or-treating with her friend Lily who was also dressed as an anime character from the same show and then having s'mores afterwards. Lily's mom went along with the girls and Lily's younger siblings, making sure all were safe in what is thankfully a very safe area.
After taking photos, Gina came over to help Julie and me hand out Hershey's candy in our Merion Golf Manor neighborhood. The new Covid-era rule is to set up a table in the driveway to either hand out candy or simply leave a bowl for the kids to choose their own treats.
I have to say there weren't as many children as we expected based on the number of swingsets we see in yards, but I also think over the years more controlled activities like mall trick-or-treating, "Trunk-or-Treat' like they had at our church and parties have replaced going door-to-door. Something we appreciated was trick-or-treating being relegated to smaller children with few teen-agers.
Gina always celebrates every holiday in style. She hosted a Halloween soiree with Laszlo's parents Z and Ria driving in from Nanuet, New York, to join the festivities.
Ria and Emma made some incredible Lady's Finger Cookies, which, keeping with Emma's dark Halloween theme of her costume, looked like chopped off fingers. My sister Darlene also sent some Halloween treats that were in the sweets spread.
Emma, Ria and Z also made California Rolls, which were terrific. I've never had homemade sushi, and the freshly prepared Japanese cuisine was a real treat for me.
Laszlo took Z and Ria with him for a weekend trip to Charleston, South Carolina, to check another state park off his list. He said that in addition to some great hiking, they enjoyed seeing Spanish moss draping trees of old plantations and also some southern meals.
Gina and Emma brought Halloween decorations to our house on Saturday. We enjoyed a nice day together. After lunch, we watched a movie called "Oddball" about a dog that saves a penguin colony.
Always thinking ahead, Gina brought over a role-playing mystery game, "Turkey, Cranberries and Murder," which she bought to play when her siblings come together with us in Philadelphia the week before Thanksgiving. It was fun reading about the quirks of the various characters in order to lay the groundwork for the game.
Rather than mailing them out the official invitations, which include some special instructions for each character, we sent an email summary of the character list along with the assigned roles in our game. We're all looking forward to playing.
Julie made a delicious Beef With Brocolli Stir Fry dinner that we all enjoyed.
We also took a walk around the neighborhood past those beautiful fall colors.
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