Here it is November the 1st as I write this, and it is time for my annual gloating. This story goes back a few years to when my son was in elementary school. He had two friends that lived near: a half mile away. In the country that means not too far away to ride to on a bike when you are in upper elementary school, and not too far away for a parent to quickly drop you off by car. In the suburbs, near means across the street.

Of these two friends one was a year older than him and one a year younger. So when he visited with them at their home he had two friends. Plus he had the bonus of their mother, who was a stay-at-home mother with no job outside the home. After all, any person would think that four children was a job in itself. Anyways, unlike his own mother who worked in her office at their home, his friends’ mother baked pies, cakes, cookies, cupcakes, bars and other treats. He loved going over there.

His friends’ mother did have rules. Where at my home you did not track dirt into the home, which usually meant take your shoes off on entry to the house, the friends’ mother had a rule on Halloween that you could trick-or-treat for all the candy you wanted, but before you went to bed on October 31, you had to eat whatever you could, and the rest would be thrown out, in order to protect your teeth and general health. My rule on Halloween was you couldn’t eat it too close to dinnertime on November 1, and it would be financially prudent if you parceled it over a few days. Apparently the Halloween candy rule was strictly enforced by the friends’ mother. It seemed to be one of her stricter rules. One year towards the end of November when my son and his friends were approximately 11 years old, my son came home from school with news he had a hard time telling us because he was laughing so hard when he told it. The day before, his friends had gotten home from school and at first couldn’t find their mom in the house. They then walked in on her in her bedroom where they discovered her hurriedly putting back in her closet their bags of Halloween candy. Discovered and confronted by them, she admitted she had never thrown out their Halloween candy over the years, but had merely hidden it in her closet and eaten a little at a time over the ensuing weeks. I absolutely howled with laughter upon hearing this news. How good to find that the provider of all those desserts for her children and their friends over the years was a secret candy thief. For someone like me who didn’t bake, this was delightful news.

I consider myself a religious person. I am fully aware that the Bible says we should love one another. I Corinthians, Chapter 13 gives a definition of love of others, which includes that we should not delight in the fall of others. Verse 5 specifies that love does not gloat over other men’s sins, but delights in the truth. Actually, what is the difference between delighting in the “fall” of the dessert mommy and delighting in the truth that she was a closet candy thief? Her children only found it very funny that the candy police was really the candy thief. They were not angry at all about it. How could anyone be angry at a mommy who baked pies, cakes, etc.? Anyway, being religious, every November 1st I only delight in the truth about this memory, and repent for savoring it at night. I figure I’m covered.
Angela Hawkins Fichter