Mother Nature's Trick-or-Treat

I love Halloween. I love the spooky feeling on a chilly fall night when there's a big yellow harvest moon outside my window. I love watching the old Universal horror films, or my favorite Halloween chestnut, Arsenic and Old Lace. I love seeing my neighborhood come alive with tiny witches, fairies, robots, and superheroes. But this year, Mother Nature has been up to some tricks of her own, and dropped a load of mischief on us out here in the east. And to that I have to say: Really? Did you really have to snow on my Halloween parade?

Today at least, the sun is shining, and neighbors are outside cleaning up broken tree branches and upending all those overturned Halloween decorations. And there is something beautiful about fall leaves against a backdrop of snow:

But not beautiful enough to justify an early end to my favorite season of the year. My pumpkin is on the porch, my witch stands guard at the door (though she's a bit chilly), and my treat bowl will still be full of candy, weather be damned. Happy Halloween, everyone.