Hallowe’en, Part II

Last year, we had three folk come by dressed as Obama. One of them was a young black boy who lives across the street. He wore a suit and very proudly announced that he was dressed as our next President. It seemed a hopeful thing, and a moment when the world changed at least a tiny bit.

This year, his older brother–who is white–ran down the street in a KKK hood made from a white kitchen trash bag singing either Fight the Power or White Power, I could not tell which. He didn’t stop and ask for candy, just made a mad dash down the very center of the street while the younger children in Princess and Transformer costumes brought me their plastic pumpkins to be filled.

I did not, do not, know what to make of it.

The young woman who lives next door, and who knows him, said only, “Oh, he’s funny.” She did not think he meant anything vicious by it, though it was a startling thing to see.

I do not know what to make of this; whether to be troubled by it or simply to see it as passing strange. But it was such a sharp contrast to last year I am unable to let the image go.