Many Octobers ago I was a youngish wife and mother of six children, the youngest   having just had his 3^rd birthday. A horrific storm threatened to batter our little house on the Harper waterfront near Port Orchard to pieces.  An old frame house, it had no insulation in the walls; the front facing the bay was all single pane windows.  So the wind from the north was coming into the house through all the cracks in the knotty cedar paneling.

The house shook with every gust of wind and the kids were afraid to go upstairs to their bedrooms.  We stayed up late that night while the storm raged on and we eventually lost power.  We huddled around the old wood range in the kitchen for which Charlie had thoughtfully gathered enough wood to keep going through the night.

A couple of kerosene lanterns were found in the garage and one was placed in the middle of the dining room table. The board games came out and we sat on the benches playing Monopoly and other games and just pretended it was just another game night at the Atkinsons’. 

We finally climbed the stairs and went to bed for the rest of the night.  Thankfully, the wind calmed down somewhat by morning.

The next day we got to know the neighbors.  Without power the ones who had not yet signed on for Manchester Water were on wells that only produced water with an electrically run pump. To those neighbors we provided water.  They had electric or oil furnaces, as did we, that required power to turn on and like most houses on the beach at that time we all had fireplaces, but they came over with tea kettles and coffee pots to set on our wood range.  As I remember there was a large pot of soup bubbling away on the back of the stove.

The power was out about a week.  None of us had trees fall on our homes or garages, but there was plenty of damage throughout the neighborhood that Columbus Day l962.  It was a temporary inconvenience but we were happy to get to know the neighbors a little better, some of whom we still cherish as friends.

And after a heart warming story like that all I can add is:

BOO-YAHHH

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!