The Magic of Halloween

My family's jack-o-lantern creations. Luckily,  you can't really see mine. 

These are just a few of the jack-o-lanterns from this year's Pumpkin Glow. There really were some incredible carvings. 

As blood-thirsty, savage and maybe even down right evil as it sounds,  I have to say I take a huge amount of pleasure giving a pumpkin a lobotomy.

When I was a kid and my family covered the kitchen counter with newspaper, pulled out an assortment of kitchen knives and attacked our Halloween pumpkins with them, I was always in awe when that pumpkin's top would come off and I could peer into its insides. Those clusters of tapered shaped seeds hanging from thick, slippery orange strings and gourd's deep, cavernous interior   seemed liked a whole other fantastical world.

I also took delight in plunging my hand into the dark interior of the pumpkin to yank out all its tangerine-colored gunk. There was something satisfying about peering into the pumpkin afterwards and seeing nothing but a smooth, unblemished surface.

I wish I could say my actual jack-o-lantern carving skills matched my enthusiasm to gut pumpkins but sadly, no. This year I attempted to carve a grinning skull onto my Halloween pumpkin and my sister noted it looked as though the poor skeleton's nose was hit by shrapnel.

I despise saying this but some magic in all the holidays has dwindled now that I am adult. The count down to Christmas doesn't have the same exciting thrill, the televised Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade no longer has any attraction and I no longer go on scavenger hunts for Easter eggs. But I am proud to say the thrill of gutting a pumpkin has remained with me.

Even better,  now that I am a board member of the Los Alamos Arts Council and the organization hosts an annual Pumpkin Glow, I merrily spend one Saturday morning each year giving lobotomy after lobotomy to a long line of pumpkins to prepare them for the evening's event. My hands are coated with the guts of pumpkins and the table looks like a crime scene with carving blades encrusted with pumpkin innards and the gourds' fibers and seeds splattered everywhere.  I still feel a deep sense of satisfaction peering into the pumpkin when the job is done and seeing that it was done right.  It still feels magical.