The pumpkins appeared again this year early last week. The highlight of the fall, sign that Halloween can proceed as usual. The one tradition at the university revered by all. Great secrecy surrounds the act. No one ever really knows for sure exactly who gets them up there. Members of the outing club, perhaps, and most likely. But always some sort of cabal. And the technique involved makes for speculation too. I’ve been told there is simply a door up there out onto the roof and that skewering the pumpkins onto the copper spires is not that difficult. Others say the climbers use extreme rappelling techniques, long ropes, great skill. From the ground it always looks impressive, no matter what is really the procedure. One year four pumpkins appeared. Rumor says the pumpkins must be stolen from a townsperson’s porch. When did the practice begin? I am not sure. I would say that it didn’t happen when we got here in ’72. I think it all began sometime after ’72, maybe for sure by ’78 it was established as annual ritual. Even this minor/major cultus helps demonstrate the truth of Pieper’s slogan, that leisure is the basis of culture.
Started reading J G Ballard’s Crash. How did I ever miss this book, published first in 1973 in England. Only thirty pages in and I feel like I am back in the period—the late 60s and early 70s. Surely American Psycho owes a great deal to Crash. Will both books go down as period pieces? I’m very curious to see how it will work. I’m using it in my section of the department’s new course—"Murder, Mayhem and Madness"—but I am predicting that the students won’t much like the book or even put up with reading it. That will be interesting to see too.
Three deaths on my mind over the past few months. The first of my high school classmates died a few weeks ago, Ed Dressman. My grad school professor, advisor and mentor, Wayne Booth died at 84 just two weeks ago. And Doris Dempsey, Isa as she called herself in later years, died last spring. She was just 76. What is it about grief? Leaves you without words. So am I numb or in disbelief or hardened or resigned or confused? All of these and some more. Philosophical you could say to put a big word on it. But don’t kid yourself. Put your hope in the mystery of the pumpkins.
