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Justine and I started fretting about this back in July or August—how would kids do Halloween this year? We came up with elaborate ideas from hanging candy from trees outside and inviting kids to harvest them to tossing candy out the window to using a remote-controlled car to deliver treats to kids waiting at the end of the walkway. Would anyone even come? Were there any safe options?

The twins probably weren’t going trick-or-treating, but we were looking forward to passing out candy. We want to be a good neighbour, and it’s fun to see the costumes. Plus my heart went out to all the little kids who had been looking forward to this. It was going to be a little island of not-suck in a sea of suck.

But then our town canceled Halloween.

Some people said it’s for the best. Others said they were going to take their kids around anyway. Some of us sat there and said, “Uh… if you’re showing up here, I need to get candy. But getting candy means that I’m ignoring the town ruling. Uh… what am I supposed to do? Strong leadership, where are you?”

It rained one Halloween when the twins were little, so we went trick-or-treating inside. I went into one room and closed the door, and the twins knocked and said, “trick or treat!” And I gave them candy. Then I ran to a different room while they were trick-or-treating at Josh’s room. We went from room to room like this for a while until they felt done.

The best idea I’ve seen so far is to hide the candy in the house a la Easter and have a candy hunt indoors. Of course, it helps to number all the candies so you know you’ve found them all. But I think it’s fun because the kid has to wait in another room, counting to 100, while older kids hide the candy. And then they get the joy of actually finding stuff vs. being handed a piece of candy from their parent for the tenth time in the same night.

What are you doing for Halloween?

I love love love love love (yes, I need to write it five times) this article in the Guardian, summarizing a lifetime of lessons learned from writing a column about happiness. The writer states: “These are the principles that surfaced again and again, and that now seem to me most useful for navigating times as baffling and stress-inducing as ours.”

It is an incredibly helpful list. These nuggets of wisdom spoke to me:

In regards to the idea that there isn’t enough time to do everything you want to do each day: “The only viable solution is to make a shift: from a life spent trying not to neglect anything, to one spent proactively and consciously choosing what to neglect, in favour of what matters most.” Yes.

Also: “The capacity to tolerate minor discomfort is a superpower.” The whole paragraph attached to this is a brilliant statement on how much we do to avoid something uncomfortable, which is something we can deal with because that’s the whole point of minor discomfort—it’s minor.

And this, right now. This statement is getting me through the right-now: “The spiritual teacher Jiddu Krishnamurti said his secret was simple: ‘I don’t mind what happens.’ That needn’t mean not trying to make life better, for yourself or others. It just means not living each day anxiously braced to see if things work out as you hoped.” What is outside our control is outside our control. Fretting about things is not action.

What spoke to you in the article?

Adrienne LaFrance (from The Atlantic) asked on Twitter: “What’s the first magazine you ever loved?” What follows is a long list of magazines—some still operating, some defunct—that is an amazing stroll down memory lane.

It reminded me that Mad magazine was my elementary school crush. I wanted a subscription so badly, but I felt awkward asking for it because I also had to have my sister explain a lot of the jokes in it. Our dentist had it at his office, and that was the pure joy of going to the dentist—time in the waiting room trying to fold in the back picture, creased by so many prior patients.

But my first true love, my first mature magazine relationship, was Sassy magazine. I started reading it with the first issue (purchased at People’s drug on the lower level of the mall), and I kept reading it long after I left the demographic. At some point, my mother made me cull my collection and only keep the most important articles. I still have them today.

That magazine was incredible. I wish girls today had Sassy. It was truly a life-changing, empowering, mind-expanding paper companion.

What was your first favourite magazine?

Do you remember years ago—like I’m talking YEARS ago (it was back in 2007)—that we had a candy exchange in the ALI community? We had a form that people filled out stating where they were from and the common candies found in their neck of the woods. And then they could request a certain type of candy that they had heard about or a country they were curious about. And then everyone matched and sent each other candy. I have zero memory of who got my candy. I think mine was sent by someone in Australia.

I read an article about snack pen pals, and how people are grabbing friends on distant shores and trading boxes of snack foods. Because this is so true:

Back when traveling was a thing, supermarket snacks were undoubtedly a must-have souvenir. I’d always make a point to visit at least one grocery or convenience store during any trip, and then spend any leftover foreign cash on candy and junk food at airport stalls.

Online shopping has eliminated the same need that drove the original candy exchange. If I want to get the kids a box of Nutella B-readys, I don’t have to fly to France or have someone send us a box. I can go online and easily find them for sale. So that has killed some of the excitement around a snack exchange or candy exchange.

But it’s the surprise of ending up with something you didn’t know about; something you would have found if you had traveled and gone to the supermarket yourself in a foreign country. Plus the joy of a random box of treats popping up. Plus, your friend knows your tastes and limitations—we keep kosher, so we count on friends who send us stuff to know the ins and outs of kashrut.

So I kinda sorta love this idea, especially if you have friends around the world.

We brought a new guinea pig into our home. We’re still mourning Linus, so it’s a lot of mixed emotions right now, and it’s likely too soon. But this is how things aligned.

Wait. This is not the way I want to do this. First, meet Beorn Hazel:

He is a 9-week-old mixed breed—half teddy, half American shorthair. A mix of Truman and Linus. His fur is the best of both breeds—thick like a teddy and soft like an American—and a little wavy. He is technically a tricolour because he has a caramel stripe on his head, just like Linus.

We had been looking at baby guinea pigs to bring another pig into the house, and a breeder I follow posted an August litter a little before Linus died. We had been looking at him, and after Linus died, I wrote her to see if he was still available and paid her once she said he could be ours. We made arrangements to pick him up a few days later because she lives an hour away.

During those days, I went back and forth. He was cute, but I didn’t know if I was ready for this. I wanted my pig—my Linus—not a different pig. Baby food was sold out in three different stores, which felt like a sign from the universe. It was too soon.

So we made up a series of code words to each other before we left to pick him up. We had a word that meant absolutely not. If anyone said that word during the pickup, we were going to forfeit the fee and go home to regroup. We had a word that meant absolutely yes. We each had to say that word before we would leave with the pig. And we had a final code word that meant, “A decision needs to be made” if anyone hadn’t voiced their opinion and it was time to go.

I was so unsure of what we would do that I didn’t set up the cage before we left. I cleaned it out, crying the entire time, but left it empty with the food bowls stacked outside. It could have gone either way. But when she brought him out, every word left my head. He was tiny and sweet and terrified. Even though the code word was my idea, I was so discombobulated that I was the final person to use it. We were all in agreement within the first fifteen seconds of seeing him—this pig was coming home with us.

That’s a piece of red pepper behind him

The first day was hard. I cried a lot. He was not Linus. He was very shy and didn’t want to eat anything beyond hay. He was fine being picked up and cuddled, but he wasn’t talkative. He didn’t drink from the water bottle. He didn’t popcorn. He didn’t explore. It was the opposite of our first day with Linus.

We left him alone for a few hours, and then the ChickieNob coaxed him to eat. And the Wolvog got him to start chutting while he was being cuddled. And by the next morning, he was happy to have spring mix for breakfast and nibble some baby food and explore his cage and wheek a few times and play in our laps. We’re getting to know one another. He’s still awful with the water bottle—he cannot seem to master drinking from it—and he needs to be hand-fed every new food in order to believe that it’s really food. But he’s settling in with us, and we’re settling in with him. It will take time.

So his name… Beorn is from The Hobbit, the shape-shifter who would turn from a man (American shorthair) into a bear (teddy)*. He helps Gandalf, Bilbo, and the dwarves when they need supplies and respite. And Hazel is a translation of the Ogham month—Coll—that he was born in. It’s also a nod to Umbrella Academy.

We are trying to be fair to Beorn. He’s our new sweet boy in his own right, not a replacement for Linus. We’ve shown him videos of the friend who should be here with him, and I think Linus would have liked bossing him around. It’s nice to have a pig in the house again.

And taking glamour shots.

* Of course, we’ve been calling him ManBearPig.