When I say we were scary, I don’t mean like the Church Lady.
I mean, the Church Lady (Thank you, Dana Carvey.) was quite scary…in more ways than one…albeit funny.
I guess I mean to say we didn’t shy away from Halloween…which, when you think about it, makes sense. After all, we grew up watching reruns of The Munsters and The Addams Family. Talk of the devil’s holiday wasn’t an issue…at least in Oak Cliff…so we all dressed up and trick or treated as children.
As we grew a little older and entered our teenage years, we continued to view Halloween more as a way to have fun with our friends…or even reach out to the community…or (believe it or not) raise money for church youth activities.
This manifested itself in different ways.
For instance and at one point, we used the youth building across from our church as a haunted house to raise money for a mission trip.
Another year, our youth group had a retreat or something out at Mt. Lebanon (our local, Baptist encampment)…back then our church had its own lodge.
And, actually, I’m not sure if we stayed the whole night…but they (Mt. Lebanon) allowed us to have a Halloween scavenger hunt...truth be told.
Jodi B. and I were in charge of the hunt; we had to drive out the night before to set it up. And I remember dreaming up the clues (or we both did); then we put them together and planted them around the grounds of the retreat. One clue was on a white sheet, and we spray-painted it with red paint to look like blood. One clue was in a humongous pickle jar which I had previously used as a bug collection and fumigation repository for a science project…but I can’t remember exactly what we did with the jar. We also had a pail with all kinds of food slopped in it…which sat out over night…and attracted many critters (Yes…that one wasn’t thought out too well.). I vaguely recall us hanging a life-size, fake corpse or some such (I cringe to admit.) from a tree.
Thinking back on it…I hope we gave out some decent prizes to the winners because dealing with that pail alone deserved a prize.
And I bet you almost anything I wrote up most of the gruesome clues…because looking back on a lot of things I’ve written for the blog has caused me to come to the conclusion I was the main culprit in many of our ‘adventures.’
I have brief flashes…snapshots…of sensations from that night at Mt. Lebanon. I feel cool, dark, October air… running…gray trees…dirt…shadows…pinpoints of light from the various buildings. I think I was largely alone…I don’t know if it was because I was one of the people who set up the scavenger hunt, so I couldn’t participate.
Later that evening, I continued by myself in the huge, open-air tabernacle where we had planted one of the clues. It was so odd to be alone in this place which I had only ever experienced packed with people, sound and light.
I remember wanting to dance around the smooth, concrete floor a bit…I think I did.
Surprisingly…throughout it all…the entire night…I don’t think I was scared once.
I was young after all…and I didn’t know to be afraid.
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I’m not sure anyone else will think this is funny…but we continue to think it’s funny after all these years.
The silly thing is…we may’ve already been in college at this point and a little too old for these types of escapades. If this was the case, it must’ve been the summer…so we were together.
Recently, we bandied it back and forth via facebook message to see what we could remember about the incident…and it wasn’t too much.
Although Duane reminded us we were in his car which was a little Horizon…I couldn’t remember whose car it was, but thought it might have been a Chevette.
Okay, okay…I’ll try and get to the point.
One night, I guess we were back at Mt. Lebanon for something, but we obviously had a lot of freedom because several of us decided to take off for Goat Mountain in Duane’s mini car.
Now, I bet you’re thinking something like this: What (in the world) is Goat Mountain?
Goat Mountain was a little cemetery in Cedar Hill, Texas…not too far from Mt. Lebanon…and there was no mountain involved.
Although Goat Mountain was not its real name (I’m not sure anyone knows its real name.), but it was rumored to be a place where witches or devil worshippers would do their rituals…rituals supposedly involving the sacrifice of goats or other animals.
Sounds scary, right?
In reality, it was just a small, lonely, country cemetery…with a few scrubby bushes or trees and that dusty, lime-stone chipped top-soil so common in that particular part of North Texas.
The few times we were there, we never saw evidence of any goat-type sacrifice…ironically enough.
So, one night, I guess we were bored and thought it would be fun (or briefly amusing) to pile into Duane’s little car and head over there. My friend, Kristi, was in the car along with Duane (of course)…I can’t remember who else was along…maybe Lisa D. or Kathy or Lori or Owen…but Shawn was definitely with us because there wasn’t enough room in the car…and he had to sit back in the hatchback area…you know, the trunk area.
And he wasn’t happy about it.
Not. At. All.
I’m not sure why he came along…I bet Duane convinced him.
Consequently, it wasn’t long before we started hearing moaning and groaning from the back.
“I’m tired; I’m hungry; I’m sick,” Shawn wailed, adding other descriptive words as he dreamt them up and continuing without abatement.
Finally, someone (probably Duane) asked with a little sarcasm thrown in for good measure, “How are you, Shawn?”
“I’m fine,” he nonchalantly replied as if the previous litany of ills were never voiced in the first place.
However, in a few more moments…the complaints started up again…only to have another one of us ask how he was doing to which he would reply with the same droll answer then a brief respite.
Okay, so I guess there’s not much point to this tale, but I have to say…Duane and Shawn are still two of the funniest people I’ve ever met…Kristi comes in third…because she really knows how to tell an entertaining story (and laugh at herself).
Once we got out to Goat Mountain, I can’t remember what happened, but Kristi says we chased some people out of the cemetery…which is really hard to believe because all I can remember from that night were the cramped car conditions and Shawn’s groaning. And, generally, we weren’t really the chasing sort of group.
But, in a funny twist of fate (and this gave us the biggest laugh of all), Kristi says her husband, Scott (pre-Kristi), was chased out of the cemetery one night by a bunch of crazy people.
I’m pretty sure we’ve decided we were the ones chasing Scott and friends out of the cemetery…whether or not it’s true…because it makes a good tale.
And if I can say nothing else about my old church friends (and I, fortunately, have many good things to say about them)…it’s that we all love a good story…the more ridiculous the better.
Have a fun, safe Halloween, everyone!
Author's note: Since I published this, Shawn has very subtly let me know the incident probably occured during the winter. Well...so much for my memory.