Trick or Treat

Trick or Treat

When I was 19 years old, I lived next door to the cutest little dark haired girl. I babysat her a lot. Our families spent a lot of time together. I considered her my baby sister. It was Halloween 1991 and I had been planning to take little peanut out trick or treating so her Mom could stay home and hand out candy. Nature had a little Halloween prank for us though, and things didn't go quite as planned.

It had been a cold fall, very cold. We live in Northern Minnesota and we are hearty; we don't let a little cold stop us. We just bundle up and carry on. In some areas of the country life stops completely for a little snow or cold. Life in Minnesota does not even slow down for cold.

When we woke up Halloween morning it was snowing. No worries. I have been trick or treating in the cold before. It would stop soon and all would be fine. Except it didn't stop. It snowed heavily right on through the afternoon. Sometimes dumping as much as 2 inches in an hour! But it's Halloween! It will stop and we will go out as planned. We were sure of it.

It didn't stop. It snowed and snowed and snowed and snowed. It was the stuff of story books. Cars were not traveling. Roads were not plowed. People were not out. Sidewalks were not shoveled. It was a snowy apocalypse. Snow was well past my knees. It was cold, still snowing, and blowing. Drifts were beginning to form around parked cars and anything else stationary.

I couldn't disappoint my little sister though. I knew how much she was looking forward to going out to trick or treat. I had been looking forward to taking her. We always had fun together. So we bundled up in snow pants, jackets, hats, mittens, scarves, and boots. We couldn't even see our costumes. It didn't matter though. We were going to go Trick or treating and nothing was going to stop us. Not even the snow storm of the century.

We had to wade through deep drifts. We laughed and were exhilarated by our adventure. There was no one else out moving in our neighborhood. People were shocked that we were out in such weather and gave us handfuls of candy. They had candy and we were there to get it. We only went around 2 blocks. It took hours, but we had fun and had enough candy to last a long time.

My little sister and I still laugh about that night. How crazy we were to go out in that weather. The next morning when the storm was over and digging out had begun, we learned that we got a total of 36.9 inches of snow. Nearly 40 inches of snow had fallen in what would now be referred to as the Halloween storm.

Many years later it is still widely remembered and discussed by everyone in town. Many a Christmas was snowy. Many a Thanksgiving too. No Halloween though was as snowy as that one was, but we didn't let that storm steal our fun. We pressed onward and upward until we achieved success. I sometimes think of that day when I have to do something hard or unwanted. I didn't let that storm steal our joy. If I can take a small child trick or treating in several feet of snow, I can do whatever task is laid before me. No matter how hard it is, no matter how much I don't want to do it. I just think of my cute little sister friend on that snowy eve, and know I can.