We Cast No Spell, Promise!

Where we live, autumn isn’t celebrated by sipping maple lattes in chunky sweaters. So, driven by homesickness and a stubborn determination to give my kids some Hallmark memories, I charged Lucy and Moses to go and hide our near-rotten pumpkins around the neighborhood. I loaded their arms with the green, stripy squashes that had been staring me in the face the last couple of weeks. These festive friends had been too stout to carve but lovingly made over with goopy paint, cotton balls, and popsicle stick bunny ears. 

My two oldest nestled the gaudy pumpkins along the walking path outside our home and in the wheat fields of our neighbors. Kindly remembering their sisters’ small ages, they chose just-tricky-enough spots near haystacks, cow pies, and garbage heaps. One gourd was gently positioned in a shallow ditch near the path and seemed to peep up at passerbyers with its unsymmetrical googly eyes.

Lisette, Olive, Swede, and I set out to find our treasure. Zion babbled in my arms and mimicked her sisters’ pointing fingers. The pumpkins were discovered with squeals and an intermission of petting the chestnut calf next door with the large eyes and lashes. Lamenting that the game was over too soon, we waved goodbye to our pumpkins, sure the cows and the field mice would find them a tasty treat.  

A week later, Moses and I dropped by the neighbors’ house with gingersnaps. They invited us in for mixed fruit juice and leftover gulab jamuns and milk cake from Diwali. After telling me I look like a child and all about the bonfire they saw we had with friends the other night and that my daughter never wears enough clothes in the cold weather, they got down to business. They asked me why in the world I had put pumpkins around the walking path and in the fields. Before I could explain the enchanting game that made me a wonderfully involved mother, they told me I had freaked out the whole neighborhood. I had sent shivers down the backs of all the aunties. What kind of black magic was this?! I had no clue we had become the talk of the town, and for reasons I had never imagined. I apologized for a long time and laughed even longer. I explained, in my fastest Hindi, the game we were playing. Eventually, they were laughing with me. The rumor of the curse lost its power, and I was given another syrupy sweet as a sign they believed I meant no ill will. 

If you’ll excuse me, I need to go collect my pumpkins and make everyone pie.