There’s something about fall. Perhaps it’s the colors that slowly start to creep into the trees at the beginning of September. Or coming home to a warm house that smells of cinnamon, and pumpkin. The crunch of the leaves beneath your feet, or the memories that come in slow and fleeting then fast and constant until the season comes to a close. Why is fall so…nostalgic?
A memory seems to be following me around, and I can’t seem to shake it. It pops up any time I see a pumpkin, or think of a child’s innocence, and it was particularly strong when I made my own visit to the pumpkin patch this year. It's been haunting me this fall, like a ghost that I welcome to come and visit me because I love the amazing reminder this memory serves.
When I was about eight or nine, my siblings and I had all gone to the pumpkin patch, at various times with our schools, and each picked out our own special pumpkins. When you’re a kid and you go to the pumpkin patch there’s something almost magical about it; the hayride out to the pumpkin patch, the weird smell of something sweet but also dead, and then, of course, there’s wandering around in the mud and pumpkin guts until you pick out your own pumpkin. That year my brother had picked the biggest pumpkin he could carry, and I had picked the smallest and cutest. Even though my brother is two years younger than me at the time he was almost just as big. The pumpkin he picked was gigantic, at least in our elementary sized brains it was. We got home and excitedly showed our mom and dad our pumpkins explaining what made them special, how we found it, and what made us pick that particular one. We put them out on our front porch spending way too much time making sure they were perfectly arranged. Our collection of pumpkins grew and after about one and half weeks we had about five or six and they sat on our porch, making us smile when we came home, knowing that they represented fun, candy, and that magical time out in the pumpkin patch. One morning, I remember it so clearly, it was starting to get extra cold out, not just crisp fall cold, but a bit of winter had seeped into the air, reminding us that fall, as magical as it was, is a short-lived. Our pumpkins were gone. I remember our parents telling us that sometimes, really mean kids steal them. I remember we all cried, devastated, our little hearts crushed, we did not fully understand why anyone would want to take our precious pumpkins. I remember that it felt like it was a personal attack, instead of just stupid teenagers. They had left one pumpkin, most likely by accident, and it was my small pumpkin. I took it inside too afraid that it would get stolen again, and afraid it would be lonely. On the way to school, we saw what looked like our pumpkins smashed on the street. We cried again. I remember going to bed sad, and feeling like the magic was gone, it had left with our pumpkins. We got up the next morning still disheartened, but then our mom said, go look outside there’s a surprise for you. My dad, who ran his own business, and was already a very busy and tired man, had gone out after we went to bed, bought us new pumpkins and had arranged them just so, on our front porch. We jumped up and down, clapped our hands, and claimed that he was the best dad ever. The magic had been restored to our house, all because of a dad’s love for his children. That’s what I remember most about that memory, is that I had grasped just a little bit more of how much my parents loved me, and the lengths they would go through to show it to me.
Maybe that is why fall is so special. It’s because of the time, effort and love that our parents put into making it seem magical. Helping get your costume together for trick or treating, making special pumpkin flavored treats, getting the bags of candy ready to pass out to other trick or treaters, and of course buying, and carving pumpkins. It’s the time before life gets crazy with the family drama of thanksgiving, the hectic time of Christmas and the unrealistic New Years resolutions. It’s a time where all anyone really wants is some candy, a costume, and of course a magic pumpkin.
