What You Won’t Find at Our House for Halloween

Like many Midwesterners, I like fall. In fact, fall is my favorite season. Historically, I would say it’s because my birthday is in late August and I played high school golf, which is a fall sport. But also I like the changing of the leaves, the crisp temperatures perfect for sweaters and boots, and I like Halloween.

But after my son’s dad died, there is one Halloween decoration you will not find at our home: Cemetery headstones.

The cemetery has become a place where my son and I go to “see Daddy’s picture” and decorate from time to time. It’s a place where we dedicate time to thinking about him and pause for a moment in those memories. It’s a place where we sprinkle the ground with his favorite orange Tic-Tacs, just for fun.

It’s a place I often revisit in my mind when I think about the beautiful graveside service that was conducted one sunny day in November, the people who showed up for me that day, who held me together, who held my hand. The painstaking planning and waiting that went into the headstone purchase, knowing it would be a place for our son to visit for decades to come.

The cemetery is not a scary place for my son and I, nor is it a place that is haunted. I certainly don’t want my son to envision a skeleton coming up from the ground each time we visit.

I internally cringe each time I see headstone decor around this time of year. I dread the day my son makes the connection between those types of decorations and the place where we visit his dad. I know the time is coming.

Until then, we will continue to decorate for Halloween. We both enjoy it. Pumpkins, both freshly carved and the blow-up variety; spooky spiders and bats, goofy ghosts, characters from our favorite shows and movies dressed for the holiday, ready for trick-or-treating — those are the types of decorations we will continue to enjoy together.

[I once mentioned in passing to my therapist that I hate seeing headstone Halloween decorations. She gave a small, knowing smile. Later, when I searched online for a piece from any other writer that expressed my feelings on the matter, I only found one blog post and it was dated. Hopefully this resonates with someone else, looking for the words to explain why some aspects of “fun” holidays are hard to experience after loss.]