A Reward For True Believers//October 258th, 2021

You are just six years old when your aunt tells you that a being called The Great Pumpkin exists.

You wonder why you never hear the other children talk about him. Any magical creature that comes to your home to leave a gift is something worth talking about, right? All the other children always talk about Santa Claus, or the Easter Bunny. Since that day when your classmate lost a tooth on the kindergarten pumpkin picking trip, everyone has been comparing how much money the tooth fairy leaves for them after each visit.

But no one, not even your older cousin or your neighborhood friends’ older siblings, have ever so much as mentioned The Great Pumpkin.

You soon realize, though, that none of the other kids have ever spoken of Halloween the way that you do. They go around asking, at the beginning of the month, what you’re going to be, and maybe talk about candy a little bit after the fact, but that’s it. They don’t get lost in the thought of it, the way that you do. There’s no spark of pure magic that comes from the imagery of pumpkins glowing on a dimly lit porch in the night, the way there is for you. They spend the year waiting for Christmas or their birthdays, while you  begin counting down to Halloween the second you return from trick or treating. 

And it is with that thought that you realize, The Great Pumpkin must be some type of secret. So few people seem to choose Halloween as their favorite holiday, and therefore The Great Pumpkin chooses few in return. 

It makes sense that your aunt would know of him. She is the one who got you into Halloween, and is the only other person you know who calls it her favorite holiday. No one else in your family would care enough to be chosen. You’ve trick or treated for two years now; you suppose this was your test. You’ve proven your love for Halloween, and now it will be rewarded with a visit from a magical being so secret, you’re certain everyone you know would be jealous. Perhaps it would even make you popular. But you would never betray the trust of The Great Pumpkin. And it’s exciting to have a secret that’s all your own.

But you ask yourself, what does The Great Pumpkin look like? Surely there must be something about him that stands out. Though all pumpkins are great in their own way, there must be something that sets apart The Great Pumpkin. You think about it for a bit, looking at your own decorations, and thinking about pumpkins you’ve seen. Then, finally, it comes to you.

The Great Pumpkin must be a pumpkin with the body of a ghost. It’s an image you’ve seen before, though not quite as frequently as regular pumpkins. Clearly this spiritual, magical entity must be the being that will visit you on the night before Halloween. It only makes sense. And only those who have been chosen, those like yourself, would recognize the image. You’re proud of yourself for decoding The Great Pumpkin’s secret message. Suddenly, everything makes sense.

You lie awake on the night before Halloween, listening like the other children do on Christmas Eve. You don’t dare peek outside your bedroom door, like you’ve done in the past looking for Santa Claus. The Great Pumpkin chooses secrecy, and you must respect that. For you have been chosen. Every noise you hear, you question. Was that the sound of a toy being left in the living room? Could that rattling be some kind of eternal candle, making noise inside his head as he moves? 

Do most children dream of Halloween, on the night of October 30th? 

You don’t know, but you do know that in the morning, all your dreams will come true. Halloween is your reverse-Cinderella story, the day that everything turns into pumpkins, exactly the the way you want things to be.

And now you know, though you may never truly see him, that because you’ve chosen this day as your own, you have your own fairy godparent.