Driving out of Ely returning Juliet to college after her short fall break, we started off like we usually do, by listening to her playlist. After a couple of songs we began to talk about scripts and movies and ideas for stories long and short. We batted ideas back and forth a bit, like you would do with a ball on a tennis court or paddle ball or ping pong where you’re both hitting the same ball and the ball doesn’t change, but each person’s (player’s) perception of the ball changes after each successful return.
This is what we do and then we get coffee in Virginia and some late breakfast and continue on down the road. From our discussion, from the pumpkin spice smell in the coffee shop and the colder temperature in the air I had already begun to wish I was riding my purple Western Flyer with the racing slick back tire around town scouting for neighborhoods to hit up for trick-or-treating. Our volley of ideas back and forth had planted a seed in my head and I told Juliet about it as it began to sprout.
If I could actually time-travel, one of the things I would do instead of trying to “correct things” or change past events of my life, I would instead do some things that I really can’t do now. I would experience over again, some pure unadulterated fun. I’d waste any potential profitability scheme pointed toward my future just to dress up in a costume and knock on doors with a group of my friends and collect candy, stories and memories during a cold and spooky night. It seems a shame to me that as an adult that’s one part of life that is gone forever. On top of that, with type two diabetes trick-or-treating would be pointless.
I get it. Life changes. I don’t need a pile of candy. I’m blessed with many other things to unwrap and enjoy on a daily basis. However, that doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t like to stash my winter coat that Mom made me leave the house with over my costume and enjoy the thrill of the darkness seeping in around us as we ran down sidewalks and from door to door, as we looked for friends under masks and rubber hands, as I imagined the thrill never ending. The crunch of leaves under foot, the bump of the plastic pumpkin jack-o-lantern bucket against your leg, snow in the air. Bring on the “flux capacitor.”
A little further down the road the tamarack trees and the dried grasses that they sprung up from splashed competing shades of golden yellow across the horizon. These suddenly shouted out over the wetlands as the sun peaked out from the fog and brought both sides of the highway to vibrant life. The rows of tamaracks against their evergreen neighbors looked like jagged, grinning jack-olantern teeth.
Four hours more to go and unloading and stairs and some snacks and hooking up her television and staying overnight at Simon’s house in St. Paul and a great Mediterranean breakfast at Shish and nearly four additional hours later I had occasion to daydream of Halloween Past again. As the highway rose and fell again just before Robinson Lake on 169, the sunlight exploded out of the steady rain for just 30 seconds and the widest rainbow I’ve ever seen suddenly showed bright over the treeline across the lake.
Without too many tricks along the way, I’d had plenty of treats. I’d completed my time-travel wish. I was home again.
