I am sure that it was not a regional thing… it had to be purely local, or even just in our neighborhood. But we had a series of nights that would lead up to Halloween. Halloween was pretty much the same in any community. But the evening before Halloween in our neighborhood was given over to “door bell night”. Really innocuous… kids would simply run the neighborhood, run up to folks’ homes and ring their door bell, and then high tail it down to the next home. Not too harmful, of course it was a nuisance in our house; because our ever-alert Bedlington Terriers always barked at a knock on the door, or a ringing of the doorbell. By the end of the evening they would be horse… and Mommie Soph would have lost her patience.
The night before “door bell night” was “chalk night”. And on this evening we would take chalk (or bath soap), and graffiti up the sidewalks (calling attention to certain residents who we felt were mean spirited)… or we employed our ivory soap to make artistic designs on car windows (once again, payback to cranky adults who complained about kids making too much noise, or having too much fun).
The night before “chalk night” was “toilet paper night”. Not hard to figure… the local stores had to love this, as several rolls of TP would not be used in the normal fashion of wiping fannies; but rather would be draped on tree limbs and over phone lines. And if there was an adult who was particularly nasty (or had a reputation for being chintzy on Halloween itself), then they might be treated to the mummification of their car in Charmin (especially if it was a compact).
Not horrible stuff.
At one point, these minor league shenanigans begin to lose their appeal. There is a divide in the road… some travel down the path to more destructive forms of mischief, and others travel down the path to the “old fogie’s home” and leave the mayhem to younger kids.
I forget when I lost interest in the pranks. Maybe I was too young? But I can recall one year my next door neighbor and I decided to reverse the tables. I think I was in 9th or 10th grade, and David Kimberly (who by the way went to Hopkins… then to Amherst, and is now a Minister) was in 8th or 7th and we decided that we would set up a defense perimeter around our houses.
The typical path that pranksters would take running between our houses covered about 25 yards of lawn, interrupted by our driveway. Each of our homes had shrubs and bushes planted in gardens that were directly in front of our houses. With great military skill, we decided to trap the obvious access route that kids would use in cutting across the lawn leading from one house to the other. First we put a series of low tripwires in the path. In between the wires we put wooden poles (used at other times for my mothers’ tomato plants) lying flat on the grass. Then we took up positions behind the bushes and armed ourselves with straws and bowls of dry peas. We then had covering fire to anyone entering the tripwire, or stumbling on the garden poles.
Now we waited in the dark.
It was a little disappointing. Not only were there not many kids that night; but those that did approach the houses used the sidewalk and did not use the “shortcut” across the lawn. Rats. But finally we caught someone in our web. We heard her steps, lighter than a boy’s, and easier breaths… we knew it was a girl. And like a deer she raced from my house to David’s… caught her foot on the first trip wire, tumbled into the garden poles, and then was caught by a hail of peas coming from two directions… she had just landed in our bee hive! Think twice next time before you think about ringing our doorbells!
The girl was Beth Sars. She lived up the street from us. She was our age… meaning I think she fell in between David and me. She had an older brother Dennis (who was 3 years older than me) who I used to love playing basketball with. But Beth was considered strange (as was her mother… and if it wasn’t for Dennis’ presence, he being sort of a tough guy, then Mrs. Sars’ car would have been marked for special treatment on chalk night)…
Beth was a thin blonde… but I can not remember anything else about her appearance. Could she have turned into a beauty? Maybe. But as a kid there was a brooding quality about her. And there was the time (when she was about 7 or 8) when she went running down the street wearing only panties yelling that her mother was chasing her with scissors. This event went unseen by me; but far too many folks did see it (and made note of it) for it to be considered an exaggeration… not the part about her mother actually chasing her with scissors; but the part about her running down Alston Ave nearly nude.
That Doorbell Night David and I had hoped to catch a bigger fish in our trap… we had to settle for Beth Sars. Why couldn’t she have used the sidewalk like everyone else that night… she would have been out of our peashooter range… no. Once we realized who had violated our perimeter, we called a halt and ceased fire. We stifled our laughs, secure in our hidden positions… waited for Beth to pick herself up (take a quick look about… what the hell had happened?); brush the leaves off her pants, fix her sweater… and then continue down the street to the next house.
David and I met on the drive… giggling (and this was before the time of “high fiving”… or we would have high fived)… relieved that all our preparation didn’t go for naught… but a little disappointed that we didn’t get that little shit Chris from McKinley Ave.