One of My Funniest Halloween Memories

It was Halloween 1968. I was seven years old. I had rummaged through all the old clothes in my moma's cedar chest to see what I could dress up like before my uncle picked me up to go trick-or-treating. My uncle was born on Halloween and he enjoyed taking all of us children about and watching us get our candy and scares. This Halloween, my younger brother and sister would be coming along for their first time. My oldest cousin would be dressed as a ghost, so my mom dressed my brother the same way to match him. I decided to dress as a Hobo.
We were all cranked up and ready to begin our adventure. My brother, sister, and I were on our couch looking out the window intensely awaiting the arrival of my uncle. My mother was chattering away about the do's and don'ts of trick-or-treating. How we'd best mind our uncle or he'd never take us along with our cousins next year. I was told to watch out for my brother and sister as I was the eldest. It was my job to keep up with them and make sure they didn't get lost or runned over.
Finally, a car was turning into our driveway with the headlights beaming brightly. My mother turned on the porch light. My uncle honked his horn signalling for us to come on out and get into the car. Mother followed us to the car to speak to my uncle. It was always late when my uncle came because of his job. He ran a car shop in town and knew of all the neat houses to take us to from his regular customers.
My uncle asked us if we were all ready to go trick-or-treating. We all eagerly hollered, "Yes." He backed the car up and headed down the driveway as we waved goodbye to my mother. He told us there was some special houses he was taking us to in town. But, we'd hit a few houses on our way there. He told us that when we got to town he'd let us out of the car to walk house to house as he followed us behind in the car.
We were all in awe at all the houses that were decorated. There were a few that played scary music or had people dressed up that popped out to scare us. Each house that we could trick-or-treat at had their front porch lights on or had a unique jack-o-lantern lit brightly. We hit several houses on our way to town. People were very generous in giving treats. Some evn gave money. Others gave us pop corn balls or carameled apples.
When we got to town, he let us out at the first subdivision. He slowly followed us in the car just as he said he would. There were long lines of other parents doing the same thing. There were crowds of kids going from house to house, zig-zagging back and forth from one side of the street to the other. All were chanting trick-or-treat loudly in the cold night air with foggy breath appearing with each word..
Somehow we all got broken up as a group. I found myself alone and frantically began looking for everyone. I no longer saw my uncle's car. After what seemed like hours, I decided to strike as many houses as I could on my own while searching for my brother, sister, and cousins. I had come to this huge house. The back door had a light on. I chanted the famous words and an elderly woman answered the door and invited me in. She told me that she was out of candy and then asked if I'd like a piece of chocolate pie. She pulled out a chair at her table for me to sit down as she got my pie. I remember feeling so fortunate to have made it to such a special lady's house.
I finished my pie, Thanked her, and told her how delicious her pie was. Then I headed down the dark road searching for my family. There were no street lights or other porch lights on. I had made it to the back road of the subdivision heading home. My sack was heavy and full of candy. I was hoping my family had been as lucky as I had been getting treats.
When I was almost at the bottom of the road, I spotted some ghosts walking with two other figures. I hollered out my family's names. They hollered back, it was them at last. My uncle's car was still not in sight. He had gotten stuck in the traffic. None of us had planned on being separated.
I reached my brother, sister, and cousins. I aked them if they had heavy sacks of candy. (We were all using pillow cases for our bags.) Just as they were answering me, my eldest cousin and my brohter just disappeared. I was totally stunned! I immeadiately ran to where they had been and hollered out to them.
Low and behold, they had fello into the deep ditch by where they walking. I couldn't help but laugh at how they had just disappeared and where they were. Could they have seen better, they would have never fell. They were stuck down in that ditch until my uncle caught up with us and had to use a chain for them to climb up out of the ditch. They had lost most of their treats when they fell. We all chipped in with our candies to give them some. Needless to say, this was one of the funniest Halloween's we shared together. To this day, we all laugh at that night when we remember how my uncle had to get my cousin and my brother out of that ditch with a chain.