All summer long, while my Dad worked his green thumb magic on the flower beds, I kept careful watch over my vegetables, and specifically over my pumpkins. I watered them every day, I untangled the zucchini vines from their vines as they fought to gain more ground, I talked to them, told them to grow big and strong, and coaxed them to prove the other Shadyside amateur agronomists wrong. Pumpkins could and would grow in the city of Pittsburgh.
By mid-summer, I had watched pumpkin flower after pumpkin flower fail to convert to fruit. I was getting nervous, disappointed, sad that I might not get a pumpkin out of the mass greenery that I had accrued. And then I saw one, a green lump. And under the next leaf over, another green lump. I saw about eight all together, and I knew right then and there that they would turn into proud little pumpkins.
When fall came, a couple had fallen casualty to the wet weather and the slugs, but five were still going strong, ready to be picked, and ready to join the ranks of the big Simmon's Farm pumpkins that were being prepped inside for carving. I gathered them, carefully cutting them from their vines, preserving their gnarled stems. And I might just have named each of them. I seriously think I loved those pumpkins.
Although our Halloween display tended to pale in comparison to the neighbors with spider webs, scarecrows, bushels of hay, and flying ghosts, I couldn't help but think we had the best on the block that year. Because five of the pumpkins were homegrown by me. And not even the first iteration of the puking pumpkin could compete with that.
On October 30, Devil's Night, of 1993, I was really nervous - scared for our display and the little pumpkins that were part of it. The ones that I had spent all summer tending, loving, and nurturing, who were out in the cold, vulnerable, hoping that they wouldn't be targeted by the neighborhood bullies who were notorious for their Devil's Night antics. I figured it would be okay though - after all, there were better displays to disrupt. I gave them each a hug, said they'd be alright, and found a way to fall asleep.
The next morning, when I woke up, all of our pumpkins were gone. The big carved ones, the ceramic one that my parents loved, and each of my little baby pumpkins. I was so, so sad. The saddest sixth grader in school that day. I thought it was so unfair. Why? Why would someone care so little about the person who loved those pumpkins so much?
I got over it. But to this day, there's a little bit of Don't Mess in me on Devil's Night, which is tonight. And in Big Town, USA, where the pranksters outweigh the police units, I'm pretty sure there are some little punks looking to make their troublesome nature known tonight.
At half time of the Steeler game, we carved our pumpkins. A couple of beauties grown at Maynefield Farm, which is down the street from us.
And I've got the Mr. - the one who taught the obnoxious teens who honked at my little Mini yesterday to think twice before messing - next to my Mrs. And I know that lethal combination will keep all the vagrant teens away.
