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Date:         Fri, 6 Nov 1992 11:59:00 EST
From:         Blue eyes cryin' in the rain <TRAVEN@VMS.CIS.PITT.EDU>
Subject:      Long weekend (3) -- the party and return home
Comments: To: words-l@uga.cc.uga.EDU

Halloween on the farm...

We arrive at my brother's place late in the afternoon.  He lives in Bucks
County PA, not far from Lake Nockamixon.  On his 10.5 acres, he grows flowering
plants and herbs for sale to retail nurseries and florists.  We help with the
final preparations for the party -- cutting pumpkins into jack o'lanterns, etc.

This will be a BIG party, his 10th annual Halloween bash.  The last nine have
been here at Peace Tree Farm, after the initial one while he was a student at
Cornell's ag school.  As many as 75 people are expected, and he's hired a
blues band to play in his living room.  About 1/3 of the guests will be
staying overnight; most of them will sleep out in the 'barn,' actually the
production building between his main greenhouses.  There's a half-keg on ice,
another quarter-keg in reserve, hot and cold munchies, lots and lots of
goodies.  Out back, scrap wood and old pallets are piled high, all ready to
become a bonfire.  As darkness falls, Lloyd and I pull apart 4 bales of hay on
the bed of his haywagon -- he'll be driving the tractor for tonight's hayride.
Yee-hah!

As the first guests arrive, I head upstairs to change into my costume (as
brother of the host, I get to sleep in a real bed instead of out in the barn).
My guise of Frosty the Snowman consists of a white suit designed to be worn
over your regular clothes in the operating room (it's a whole lot quicker than
changing into and out of those green scrubs).  We've already drawn Frosty's
black buttons down the front.  Add a top hat and a pipe from a party store,
and my cranberry red scarf, and I'm complete (sorry, no carrot nose).  Down the
stairs, and into the maelstrom...

Over here is the entire Addams Family -- everyone from Gomez and Morticia to
Fester and Lurch to Wednesday; they're a group of folks that Lloyd met at this
year's Philadelphia Folk Festival.  Henry VIII strides majestically across the
room, accompanied by a cavewoman (these are Lloyd and his wife Candy).  Several
beaded, headbanded hippies are in evidence, as is a Confederate major.  Laurel
and Hardy are carousing in one corner, Norm Abram from 'This Old House' is in
another.  A large woman and her siamese twin (OK, so the twin is actually an
inflatable doll) both have large cigars in their mouths.  The band's lead
singer looks something like the late Divine, and one of the guitarists looks
like Tom Waits.  I see Rapunzel with her golden hair, dancing with the Phantom
of the Opera.  An eight-foot tall scarecrow is successfully avoiding hitting
his head on the exposed ceiling beams while rocking to the beat.  The Spider
and the Fly come in a bit too late for the Best Costume judging (prizes are
beautiful potted plants) -- the arachnid half of this pair has quite a
difficult time squeezing his large and unwieldy costume through doorways.

Unlike last year, when the wet wood in the bonfire smouldered for days
afterwards, this year's fire is intense but short-lived.  Frosty doesn't get
too close to it, of course, fearing meltdown.  The party goes on well into the
night.  The band's last set ends at about 2am, but some of them linger well
afterward, enjoying the festivities.  We perform a remarkably complete
clean-up at about 3:30, and I'm asleep by 4am.

Less than 5 hours later, I am among the earliest risers.  People are sprawled
on several couches in the house, but the barn crowd has begun to stir.  Since
I'd been there before, I'm able to locate the essential morning materials --
coffee and bagels.  We make gallons of java, wander blearily around the
premises.  Strange to see these people as they <really are>.  Gomez has red
hair, Morticia and Wednesday have short hair, Rapunzel is really a brunette.
As happened several times during the party, people thank *me* for throwing such
an affair (did I mention that my brother and I have a strong familial
resemblance?  His beard and hair are much wilder than mine, though I'm a lot
grayer, and his eyes are very dark brown).

I really don't want to accompany Mark and Janis on their visit to Uncle Harry,
so I hop onto the SEPTA Regional Rail train in Doylestown, transfer to the
PATCO High-Speed Line in Philly, and call my parents from the Woodcrest station
near their house.  Have dinner and an overnight stay with them, then off to
30th Street Station for the ride home on The Pennsylvanian on Monday.  The
weather is quite rotten that day -- there isn't anyone to wave to when we round
the Horseshoe Curve just beyond Altoona.

--------------------------
Not much of a story, I know.  I had a bad experience in my one-and-only
creative writing class in high school, and that seems to have cramped my style
ever since.  Sorry it wasn't as entertaining as a ggs or abh tour.

One last thing...  Way back on the drive to Philly, Amy and I got to wondering
whether Europe or Britain has autumn colors as spectacular as those in the
northeastern US.  If not, did the Mayflower Puritans write anything about the
incredible beauty around them, or were they more interested in subduing nature
than observing it?  Or did they perhaps see the intense colors as somehow the
work of the devil or some other hyper-religious claptrap?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
neal    traven@pittvms                  Bitnet          412-624-0097 (office)
        traven@vms.cis.pitt.edu         Internet        412-624-0110 (fax)
                    "You're only young once, but you can be immature forever."
                                          -- Larry Andersen, relief pitcher