Halloween Decorations and The Law

Ah sweet Halloween. You may have formed the opinion that I like Halloween. Wrong, I love Halloween. Pull up a pumpkin and hold onto your candy corn. Here's another true story about what happens when insanity - I mean passion - meets artistic tendencies - meets the local law enforcement folks.

I did mention before that son number 4 made a rather realistic hanging man one year. Well, I had to have another hanging man, so made one, coerced the husband and son number 4 into making a gibbet (what you hang people on, sort of like the guillotine cuts their heads off) so the hanging man could look more at home.

Moving right along here, the gibbet was made, the hanging man made (wearing the husband person's old boots, blue jeans and shirt stolen from son number 4, and a really unfortunately rather real looking body and head. The body was made with PVC pipe for the armature, a foam wig head for the head and the body more than realistic feeling made from foam. Hot diggity, it was great. I didn't have a clue how to do a proper hangman's noose, but son number 4 did, so eventually we had the hanging man hanging in the side yard - near the dead end, which I have always found so appropriate.

About the second night he was on display, gently rocking back and forth in the slight breeze, I had to get up about 1 AM for a glass of water. A car was out in the circle. The car had a spotlight attached to one part of its anatomy. The spotlight was shining on my hanging man.

SWEEEEEEEEEEEET, thunkest moi. I ran to the bedroom to wake the husband. "Hey, someones outside looking at the hanging man!" After a few minutes cajoling him to rise and be about the looking at my handiwork, he was up, wearing some clothing on his nether regions and with me at the kitchen window.

Hmmm...an interesting development. The car with the two men and spotlight also had a radio. Oopsie. It was some of our local law enforcement. Oh dear. The car was joined by another.

I was almost wetting my pants and holding my mouth so the officers didn't hear me laughing. Carl said "You're going to get us arrested."

The officers (in a group) approached The Hanging Man. One reached out and pushed the Hanging Man. From having made that sucker I knew that it had the weight and feel of a body, especially in the dark. Hmm....perhaps I overdid it a wee bit.

Another officer touched the Hanging Man with a finger, it rocked back and forth, it's ghostly, luminescent face facing towards them, then away and back again. Carl started muttering about it being all my fault. I started thinking about how I would handle being someones bitch in the big house and just how much time could they give me for making a realistic Halloween decoration, for heaven's sake?

One officer turned on his flashlight and shined it onto the Hanging Man's face. He gave a bark of laughter. Like kids will do when they've discovered that the ghost in the bedroom is only a curtain, the four of them pushed the hanging man around a bit before checking out the other decorations.

Carl pulled me into the dark right before the spotlight was turned on the kitchen window. Merlin, our black tuxedo (black with white bib) male was standing in the kitchen window, watching them. From experience I know how eerie a cat's eyes can be in the glow of a flashlight at night.

"Good one, Merlin." I made a mental note to give him an extra can of tuna as reward for being such a good prop cat.

Eventually they drove off, but I was later told that all the rookies were sent out that Halloween, with the radio report of "suspicious, possibly dead person hanging at blank blank road."

At least I didn't get arrested.

But the following year it was close.

I found a fantastic plaster skull which looked just like a real skull except that the jaw was not separate from the skull part. "Cool beans, " I thought as I plunked down the cash for the skull. I knew just how I wanted to use it.

A haunt has to have a witch. I think it is a law or something. Sooooooooooo I made a witch, life size of course, with nice foamy squishy body, black rags, pointy hat, warty nose and all. In front of the witch was a large cauldron. In the cauldron was an assortment of plastic, life size bones. If I could have afforded it that year, I would have put a bubble machine inside the cauldron but had to settle for a bunch of glow sticks with some fake spider webbing on top of that to diffuse the light. The skull was put on the ground near the cauldron with a bunch more bones. Hehehe. I loved it.

Unfortunately some idiots thought it was fun to dig up some real coffins in a local cemetery, taking some of the bones with them. It was all on the news and people were really quite incensed. Heck, I love Halloween and even I knew that was Not Right At All.

I went to work since I had to pay for my addiction somehow. When I got home that evening, my next door neighbor exploded out of her back door. (Not literally. I do draw the line at exploding my neighbors.) "Hey, wait a minute!" She yelled.

"Oh God, don't tell me she's going to complain about the haunt, cars, etc." I pasted a smile on my face and waited.

"The cops came by today and they were going to arrest you."

I was astonished. "DO WHAT?"

"Arrest you. They were going to arrest you for grave robbing." She grinned and since I hadn't been arrested (yet), I started to relax. My heart was still zipping along about 180 beats a minute, though. "For real. They drove by and saw the skull next to the cauldron and thought the bones were real, too. I saw them get out of the car and thought I'd better get out there."

Yeah, sure I thought, you just wanted to hear what was going on. Gossip is alive and well in Georgia.

"They were talking about how you must be the grave robber since there was the skull and everything."

"Oh sh**." My verbal skills had deserted me.

"Yeah. So after a while I picked up the skull and said 'See, it isn't real, it says Made In Taiwan."

I thought I'd still faint. "Did they say anything else?"

Finally she answered, "No, but they did check all the bones and stuff."

I made a sound of relief. She went on "Um...you don't really know anything about the grave robbing, do you?"

I just looked at her for a minute. How does one answer that? "God NO!" Good grief, I barely can get my garden double dug and planted before having to flake out for a week. No way could I have dug up several graves and taken their contents over one night. Not to mention I wouldn't. As I said before, it's just WRONG.

Carl just looked at me when I finally got into the house. He repeated what he had said the Halloween before and pretty much on a daily basis since then, "You're going to get us arrested."

But I haven't - yet.