Halloween Obituary

            Since I was old enough to grip a bag full of candy, Halloween has been my favorite holiday. The thrill of dressing up and assuming another personality coupled with all the free candy I could gather and potentially eat put it at the top of my list. Things were pretty simple then. Cut holes in an old sheet to be a ghost. Double bag two brown paper bags for added strength, or grab a pillow case and I was set.

            Sometimes the costumes were more elaborate, but they were always fun to put together. A gypsy costume meant I could dig through my mother’s costume jewelry and scarves. My sister’s hula girl costume required coming up with a plan to keep her midriff warm. My brother always favored the mask over a painted face, which meant that after he tripped a few times, he wore it tipped up on top of his head until we got to a door.

There was usually a battle with my parents over how much dinner we had to eat. And of course, they wanted us to be warm and dry, but we wanted to show off our costumes. There were negotiations about how late we could stay out, and instructions about crossing streets safely. After enduring all this, we’d finally swarm out over the neighborhood like bats flying out of a cave.

With my kids, things were more complicated, and it seems to gets more complicated every year. We’ve become a nation that sure knows how to suck the fun out of almost everything. My husband and I went trick or treating with our kids until my son was almost in sixth grade. My parents sent us out alone, with me the oldest, “in charge,” when I was in third grade. My kids weren’t allowed to eat any candy until they got home and we checked it (and I stole all the Snickers bars). My brother, sister, and I ate and traded as we went.

Despite our reckless behavior all those years ago, I only remember two bad things ever happening. Once my sister stood on the wrong side of a screen door and got swept off the porch into some bushes. Of course, her candy also went flying and kids were diving on it like a piñata had just been cracked open. I shooed them away before too much was stolen.

Another time, after we ran terrified out of a haunted house, down three flights of stairs and out into a humid Panamanian night, my brother and I looked around and discovered that my little sister (the victim again) was so scared she didn’t run. We conquered our fear, went back, and rescued her from a very apologetic monster dad and witch mom. She got some extra candy out of that.

I feel bad for kids today. Adults have ruined Halloween. It can’t be celebrated at school. Costumes have to be appropriate. Some people think Halloween is Satan worshiping. Kids are corralled indoors for supervised “harvest festivals.” If they get candy, it has to be wrapped. Nobody gives out homemade popcorn balls or candy apples anymore because they know they’ll just be thrown away. There are curfews now. Spontaneity is dead. Halloween has been over-thought. That’s the scariest, no saddest, thing of all. 
Happy Halloweenie!

Suzie "lovin'" her Halloween costume!

Laura Keolanui Stark is hoarding Snickers bars up on South Hill, WA. She can be reached at lkstark@yahoo.com.  (This column was originally written in October 2009.)

The Good Old Days

I admit that I like shaking my kids up. Recently their jaws almost hit the floor when I pointed out a few differences between the world they’ve grown up in and the world I lived in growing up.

After watching an Elvis impersonator at the Puyallup Fair, I mentioned that when I was in college, around 1:00 in the morning, the TV stations would play Elvis singing “An American Trilogy” as an American Flag rippled in the background. When the song was over, the Indian Head test pattern would come on for awhile, then eventually there’d just be gray static. They were shocked. “You mean TV would end???”

“Yep, TV was off for the night. It came back on around 6 a.m.”

“So, what would you do when it went off?” they asked very concerned.

“I went to sleep.”

Then I really rubbed in the hard scrabble times I grew up in, minus the 30 miles barefoot walks through the snow to school. “There were only usually about four stations: the three big networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC and then you might have a local station that aired old movies, cartoons, and The Three Stooges or The Little Rascals. Oh, and you had to pay attention because there weren’t VCRs, TIVO, or OnDemand. If you missed something, too bad.” They stared at me in disbelief.

I piled it on, “Oh, and we were also limited to watching whatever my dad was interested in because we only had one TV. Sometimes he’d have to climb up on the roof to turn the antenna around to get better reception, and there weren’t any remotes. That’s why people back then had kids—to tell the kids to get up and change the channel for them.” They just shook their heads amazed that I’d survived.

Community Hall, Washington State University, Pullman, WA.

Then the other day Sarah called on her cell while she was doing laundry. She started reading some information hanging in the laundry room of her dorm. Community Hall is one of the oldest dorms on the WSU campus. “Wow Mom, there’s a list of the rules for my dorm from 1945-49. Listen to what it says! ‘Study hours are from 8 – noon, 1 - 4:30, 7:30 – 10, and 11 p.m. – 7 a.m. One could not bathe between these hours. Curfew during the week is 7 pm for freshmen, 10:30 for upperclassmen. Weekend curfew is 10:00 for freshmen, 11:00 for upperclassmen. Some girls who missed curfew used knotted bed sheets to climb in through a window.’”

She continued, “Some of the girls would sunbathe, two at a time on the balcony with a lookout because they weren’t allowed to wear swim suits.” She giggled at that part because the balcony is part of the room she was in last year. Not a week into her freshman year, she got disciplined because two boys who’d come to visit her and her roommate went out onto that tiny balcony, illegally. Swim suits weren’t the issue. Drunk students falling out of windows is the issue nowadays.

The notorious balcony of Community Hall, WSU, Pullman, WA.

“’Room 213 is the sewing room. No typing after 11:00 p.m.’” Room 213 is now her Resident Assistant’s room, and very few girls, if any, sew. Nobody’s using a typewriter to type up papers anymore either. She thought the whole thing was quaint. “Can you believe it?”

I told her that I could definitely believe it because those rules weren’t all that different from when I was a college freshman in the fall of 1973. Granted, I went to Louisiana State University, so I’m sure it was more conservative than WSU in the 1970s. To begin with, there weren’t any co-ed dorms in Baton Rouge. Students kept circulating petitions to get one started. Lots of students signed them. The petitioning student would ask female students who were signing it if they’d live in a co-ed dorm. Invariably the answer was, “Oh no, my daddy wouldn’t let me. But I still think there should be co-ed dorms.”

My choice for a dorm was much narrower than my kids’ choices--air conditioned, or un-air conditioned, and different options for how strict the curfews were. Other than that, LSU Housing assigned me to whatever was available. I got Power Hall, un-air conditioned.

They chose my roommate too, without me filling out a survey about the hours I kept, or whether I liked sleeping with the window open. Peggy was from New Orleans. She brought her black and white TV. I brought my stereo so that worked out well. The first time I talked to her was when she moved in. She was sloppier than me, but we got along just fine.

Boys were not allowed in my dorm, as in Sarah’s 1945 dorm. Any men who entered:  the janitor or repair men, would call out a warning, “Man on the hall!” as they walked past our rooms.  

There was a house mother. I had to sign in and sign out if I was leaving the dorm after 5:00. I filled in the date, my destination, the name of the person with me, hour out, expected hour of return, and hour-in on an oversized index card. On weeknights my curfew was 11:00. On Friday and Saturday nights it was 1:30 a.m.  I could feel Sarah cringing on her end of the phone call, “What did you do? I mean, when you went out to party. Did you sneak back in?”

“No, I came back at the curfew. My date made sure I got back on time. If you didn’t, you got in trouble.” To refresh my memory, I went and found my old sign out cards. The few times I was late are circled in red, but I don’t remember getting disciplined, so I must not have been late enough times to have to answer for it. It also says I was on Option 1, with the strictest curfews.

“Well, couldn’t you just stay out all night then?”

“You know, that never crossed my mind. What would I do, stay in a boys’ dorm? They probably would’ve called Campus Security if I didn’t show up.”

“Couldn’t you just sneak back in?”

“There was no sneaking in. They locked the doors. When you walked up to the doors, there’d be couples kissing goodnight, then the housemother would flash the lights, and you’d better get inside!”

“Ewwww! I hate PDA’s (public displays of affection), that’s disgusting.”

“Not as disgusting as the freak dancing your generation does. What was bad was if you’d had a crappy date and were trying to avoid the good night kiss while walking through the couples who were in love.”

“1:30, huh, so then what did you do after that?”

“I went to sleep, or talked to my roommate.”

We had a lot less electronic distractions. I think that’s why there was less ADD and ADHD then. There wasn’t even a name for those disorders. We were a lot more well-rested too. The only place that stayed open 24 hours was the emergency room.

No cell phones, so no late night texting. I talked to my parents every other weekend from a phone attached to the wall with a 3-foot cord. If I wanted privacy, I pulled the handset out into the hall. When the phone rang, my roommate or I would answer it without the slightest idea of who was calling—no caller ID. It could be anyone: parents, boyfriends, girlfriends, campus administrators, who knew? The only sure bet was that it wasn’t a telemarketer because there weren’t any back then. Some kids used football games as a primitive, free way to communicate with their parents. They’d paint signs that said, “Hi Mom!” or “Send money!” and get in front of a camera.

Here’s how my social network worked back then.  I got to know everybody on my hall, in person, face-to-face, because I was the only one with a stereo, and a popcorn popper. It got to the point where I was the hall DJ. Girls would request certain albums to study, or relax to: Motown’s Greatest Hits, Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, The Doobie Brothers’ The Captain and Me, and Joni Mitchell’s Court & Spark were favorites.

“Was the house mother mean?”

I thought back, “In my freshman dorm I didn’t get to know her. I don’t remember anyone complaining about her. I felt protected and safe with the front desk and a house mother there.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, one time there were about 50 guys streaking. We heard them coming and ran down to the lobby to watch them run by outside. All of a sudden, one of them, a big guy, came right through the doors wearing nothing but tennis shoes and a spiked pith helmet. He ran right at me! I scrambled behind the front desk, like a toddler fleeing to hide behind her mother’s skirts.”

Sarah’s laundry was done, and she had to go, so I didn’t tell her this story.  My sophomore year I lived in East Laville Hall. I had a boyfriend who I was starry eyed over. We had started dating freshman year. Sometimes I’d cook a meal in the dorm kitchen for the boyfriend, and carry it down to the courtyard for us to share.

East Laville Hall, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA.

The house mother, Mrs. Olinde, was probably about my age now. She’d watch the guys come to pick up their dates, calling us on the house phone to come down to the lobby. She kept an eye on all 400 of “her girls,” making sure we’d sign out, and chatting with us. She liked me.

One day on my way back from class, she stopped me. “What’s going on? You look down lately.”

I told her that the boyfriend had dumped me.

She shook her head, “Well, I wouldn’t waste too many tears on him. He wasn’t that great a guy.”

My eyes brimmed with tears. Then she told me, “He’d come here to pick up you up for dates on Fridays, and then come to pick up another girl on Saturdays.” She patted my hand. “You’ll find someone better.”

My 19-year-old heart was broken. I thanked Mrs. Olinde for caring.

High drama, and no Facebook to post it on. My roommate, a new one, Carolyn helped me get through it by teaching me how to crochet. I still have the ripple afghan in shades of blue. Now it’s just an old school way to keep warm. Some things change. Some things stay the same.

Carolyn, my roommate and crochet teacher, and I on graduation day.

Laura Keolanui Stark is thinking about designing a t-shirt that declares “I survived the prehistoric age of the 1970s.” She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.

Here Comes the Rain Again

One of the judges on “Dancing with the Stars” came up with my new favorite saying, “It’s never too early to panic.”

            A mild panic set in with me when I watched the news the other day. The weather forecaster with his satellite pictures, and wind milling arms shook me not too gently into the realization that it is definitely October, and fall has arrived. The final kick to motivate me was when he used technical weather terms to describe what was coming, “In two days, it will be like a fire hose is pointed directly at us.”

Uh-oh! In the Pacific Northwest that most likely means that we won’t dry out until June or July. No more procrastinating, it was time to batten down the hatches.

Most of the time it’s not the actual chore that I hate, it’s the preparation to do the chore. I needed to paint the rail of our deck, before the rain, before the temperature dropped any further. It should’ve been done last summer. No problem, I like painting. What I hate is the cleaning, sanding, and protecting surrounding areas from the paint added to the scrounging around in the garage to find out if I still had the paint or had to go out and buy new paint. And that search inevitably leads to cleaning at least one cabinet out, then figuring out how dispose of the unwanted or ancient shriveled up paint.

Guess what--Mother Nature doesn’t care. She has her own agenda and is bringing autumn to the Puget Sound within hours. I could feel her breathing down my neck. I grabbed a scrub brush, and the hose, and started washing the rail down.

While the rail was drying, I moved inside. I also needed to steam clean the carpets while it was still warm enough to open the windows to let them dry. Again, I don’t mind doing the steam cleaning. It’s the moving furniture, and vacuuming—the prepping that I don’t look forward to.

The worst part of this chore was my battle with the bathroom. I sat on the edge of the bathtub to fill the tank of the steam cleaner with water. When I stood up, in a hurry to get to work, my legs drove my head straight into the towel rack. To catch my balance, I dropped the tank, and flailed my arm hard into the glass shower door. Then I bounced onto the floor anyway and sat there for a few stunned minutes feeling like one of those cartoon characters with birds orbiting his head. The good news is that the glass doors didn’t break, and I only did that once. It took a few hours and a few lumps and bruises, but I got the carpets done. I opened all the windows and got some fans going to start the drying process.

Back to the painting--it was 4:00. In the summer, the hottest time of day here is at 5:00, but it’s not summer anymore. The thermometer hovered at 60 degrees. Isn’t that still warm enough to paint?

Even though the rail was clean and dry now, I knew I had some sanding to do. If “the boys” were doing this, they’d get the belt sander out. I didn’t have time for that nonsense. Anyway, it just needed a light sanding. I grabbed a few sheets of sandpaper and got busy.

I’d found the stain that we used on the rail a few summers ago and was pleased that there was enough to do this job.  Stirring it took a long time to get it totally mixed. It had really separated out sitting in the garage for years. I started brushing it on the rail and thought it was a little strange that it was lighter than the old paint; shouldn’t the paint I was covering have faded?  I chuckled to myself remembering when Johnny in a smart alecky mood told me that he’d never seen that color of green in nature. Ha, ha, wonder why it’s called Sage green then.

Time was ticking and the pressure was on to finish this job before it got dark and the temperature dropped. I’d moved furniture and plants away from the rail so they wouldn’t get spattered, but I didn’t take the time to cover the deck, I’d just paint very carefully. Then I looked back and saw drops of green stain on the brown deck. I doubled back to wipe them up with paper towels before they dried. As I slapped the paint on and wished Tom Sawyer would appear to help me out, I could hear neighbor after neighbor crank up their lawn mowers for the last trim of the year. Sounded like everyone else was trying to beat the clock before the rains come, just like me.

At last, done! I packed everything up, hauled it all down to the garage, cleaned the brush, and enjoyed a moment of satisfaction while the fans continued blow drying the carpets. Good thing I’d gotten all that done before the rains started.

The next morning on my way to let the dogs out, I noticed that the carpets were almost completely dry, and looked much better. Then I stepped outside to inspect my paint job.

          I don’t know if it was because it was too cold out, the stain was too old, or I hadn’t sanded enough, it was horrible! The rail looked like overnight aliens had landed on it and left a scientific experiment that had mutated into a bizarre mold/algae sludge. Johnny’s description had come true!

I didn’t have time to wring my hands over it. I had a dentist appointment. So, while lying back in the chair with a mouthful of instruments, I debated. Should I try to scrape the slime off?  It’s too sticky to sand. Maybe I should use chemicals to strip it, and then start all over. Isn’t it supposed to rain today? Maybe the rail will just have to go through the winter like that. Would be easier to just replace the rail?

When I got home I studied it more closely. It had dried more, but it still looked like grasshopper vomit. Through the Sage stain, I could see the Kelly green paint that was on it when we bought the house, beige paint from who knows when, and bare wood beneath it all.

So, I did the easiest thing I could think of: I gathered all the paint stuff up again, and started painting it again. First I read the can. It said the stain was best applied in temperatures ranging from 50 to 90 degrees. It was 60 again, but earlier in the day, allowing for more drying time before nightfall.

This time I really, really shook and stirred the stain up. And, I also stirred it several times while painting—which I hadn’t done the first time. There weren’t as many splatters this time because it was thicker. Afterwards, I walked up and down the length of the rail, waving a folded newspaper over it to speed up the drying process. Now the neighbors know beyond a doubt that I am nuts.

The last time I checked it, before the sun went down, it still looked good, like a freshly painted rail on this planet earth. I’ve got my fingers crossed that it won’t transform overnight.

Laura Keolanui Stark is ready for the rain to start. She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.com.

Yee Haw!

One summer afternoon John randomly channel-surfed to NW Backroads, a local Channel 5 outdoor magazine program hosted by Grant Goodeve. Grant was in the small town of Winthrop in the Methow Valley here in Washington.

Fast forward to the end of September. John had some vacation time, and remembered Winthrop, a town that had decided to go Wild West! He made reservations for two nights at the Sun Mountain Lodge, and also booked us for horseback riding.  

We packed sturdy shoes for hiking, cowboy boots and hats for horseback riding, and bathing suits for the hot tub, along with a couple of DVD’s and microwave popcorn for late night movie watching. As we drove across the state, the leaves were just beginning to turn. Vibrant reds and yellows sparkled against the evergreens. Other than a rolling slowdown through Snoqualmie Pass because the state DOT was blasting, the drive went smoothly. Beside the Columbia River, the road carved through orchard after orchard brimming with apples, pears, and peaches. Note to self: stop on the way home for fresh fruit.

As if on cue, a tumbleweed rolled in front of our car just as we spied the “Welcome to Twisp” sign—the tiny town just before Winthrop. This was definitely cowboy territory!

We planned to eat lunch and stroll through Winthrop before heading up to Sun Mountain Lodge.  We started scouting for somewhere to eat. There wasn’t much there, and every place we saw was closed. No wonder the two people who’d told us they’d been to Winthrop said they’d eaten up at the lodge.

We crossed a bridge, then turned around, doubled back through town, and stopped at the only place that was open, a small taco stand. John ordered a chicken burrito. I got a taco. His burrito was huge. Good thing because my taco was the smallest taco I’ve ever seen—about the size of a silver dollar folded in half. The two-bite taco was tasty, and so was the half of John’s burrito that I gobbled down.

Staying optimistic, we convinced ourselves that there must be shops up at the lodge. We sat back and enjoyed the view. It was beautiful country: hills covered in grass, trees gathered around the banks of lakes, rich farmland wherever there was irrigation.

The resort was spectacular! They let us check into our room early. We walked past a bison, the gift shop, and mounted elk and deer heads to the elevator. The windows in our room looked out onto the Methow Valley and soft yellow foothills. The view kept us from noticing for awhile that there was no TV, so no late night movies. And, there wasn’t a microwave either, so no popcorn. We thought about calling the front desk and telling them that our TV and microwave had been stolen, but figured they might not appreciate our sense of humor.

After a soak in the hot tub, we stopped at the desk, and John asked if what we’d seen was all of the town of Winthrop. Weren’t there any antique shops or art galleries? The clerk said that was it.  On the way back to the room, John shook his head, disappointed, “Wow, Grant Goodeve really made Winthrop look great.”  I told him I might have to start a new group on Facebook called “Grant Goodeve is a liar.” Oh well, there was still horseback riding to look forward to.

While John napped, I investigated everything in the room. The phonebook didn’t list any quilt shops in Winthrop. The room service menu looked good. The restaurant that we had dinner reservations in was the only four-star rated resort restaurant in the state. During the winter there were cross country ski trails and snow shoe trails. Then I found the Cascade Loop Scenic Highway Guidebook. On the back cover was a picture of a cattle drive with the Winthrop Emporium as a backdrop. We hadn’t seen that. Where was that? Inside were more pictures of a western town with wooden board walks and false-front wooden buildings, like a frontier town.

When he woke up, I showed it to John. He beamed, “That’s what I saw! That’s why I wanted to come here. After we crossed the bridge, we should’ve turned left instead of turning around. That’s where we’re going tomorrow.”

That night we ate one of the best meals of our lives prepared by Chef Bradshaw in the dining room overlooking the Methow Valley as the sun set:  Cinderella Pumpkin soup, multi-grain bread with three flavored butters, a salad of heirloom tomatoes, greens, and locally crafted cheese, lamb for John, beef for me. Dessert was homemade apple ice cream, and a crème brulee trio: vanilla, lemon, and chocolate.  The entire meal was composed from local ingredients. It certainly lived up to its four-star rating.

The next morning, we moseyed on down to the stables. John had spent many summers during his childhood and teen years on his uncle’s ranch riding quarter horses, so he’s an experienced rider. We’ve been married for so long John doesn’t expect many surprises from me, but he was surprised when I told him I’d never ridden a horse.

The wrangler, Brandon, asked about our horse riding experience, and matched us up to our horses. Stormy was John’s horse. Brandon said that Stormy liked to eat, so he’d just stop along the trail, and start eating unless he put a muzzle on him. My horse was named Marvin. When I petted his nose, he eyed me as if to say, “Oh great, another newbie.” Brandon told me that Marvin was lazy, so I’d have to kick him to get him going, and that he’d test me out in the first fifteen minutes to find out who the boss was. I would’ve felt much more in charge if I had the slightest idea of what I was doing. I was just hoping I wouldn’t embarrass myself trying to climb up on Marvin. That stirrup was awfully high and there wasn’t a ladder. John was already sitting, grinning, totally at ease on Stormy. I heaved myself up. Brandon adjusted my stirrups and told me how to stop, turn, and go. Then I had to figure out where reverse was.

We hit the trail with Brandon leading. I followed, and John brought up the rear. I didn’t think Marvin was a slacker. The only times he stopped was to poop and pee. But, he did that a lot! Four times in two hours. Brandon’s horse and Stormy only took bathroom breaks twice. He did walk slowly though and didn’t speed up when I kicked him at Brandon’s urging. Eventually Brandon broke a foot-long switch off of a tree, and passed it back to me via a bush, telling me to pretend I was a jockey and whack Marvin with it. My heart wasn’t in it. What if I whipped him and he really took off?  I was content with Marvin’s leisurely, sure-footed pace.

We wound through grassland, along a tiny creek that pioneers dug out, and up, up, up hills. When we rode through a Quaking Aspen grove I fell in love. The aspens were just turning golden yellow and whenever a breeze blew, their leaves would shimmer brightly in the wind. Brandon told us that even though each grove looked like many white-barked trees, they were all one tree with an interconnected root system.

Sitting high up on a horse was by far the best way to explore the Methow hills. It was lots less physical work than hiking (well for me anyway, Marvin may have another opinion). We went where cars can’t, and besides, the view from a car is like watching TV, sterile, separate. Feeling the sun and wind, hearing the birds, grasshoppers, and Marvin’s footsteps, smelling the fresh, grassy air was incredible.

Marvin got me back safely to the stables. I thought I’d be sore, but unexpectedly the only pain while I was riding was in my knees. I don’t think I followed Brandon’s instructions to hold my heels lower than the balls of my feet in the stirrups. Once I got off of Marvin though, my knees were fine. Fine enough to spend the afternoon walking up and down the boardwalks of Winthrop, in and out of the shops and galleries. And fine enough to hike a little ways into a grove of Aspens to take pictures. Fine enough to carry me to the hot tub and to walk me back outside later to stare up in wonder at the stars twinkling in a crisp, clear night sky. 

Sun Mountain Lodge and Winthrop surpassed our expectations even after an unsure start. Grant Goodeve’s reputation is still in good standing with us.

Laura Keolanui Stark is unpacking and enjoying the fresh fruit from the trip. She can be reached at stark.laura.k@gmail.com.