Finding Pink Snow: Happiness is...My Pet Pumpkin

Every year, for the last 20+ years, I have had a Pet Pumpkin. Not a pumpkin for carving or eating (well on occasion I have eaten my pumpkin in the end...mmm roasted pumpkin), but a special pumpkin that I will sometimes carry around, take on a trip, put next to my bed, or set on my desk to keep me company...a pet pumpkin.

As soon as I see the pumpkins come out at the grocery store I start to get excited. I love pumpkin time! I can't wait to pick out the right pumpkin. Some times I see it right away and other times I've had to sort through huge piles of pumpkins looking for just the right one. Over the years I've had huge orange carving pumpkins, petite sugar pie pumpkins, lovely white ghost pumpkins, elegant crimson pumpkins, pretty green ones, smooth ones, warty ones, and striped ones.

This tradition started back when I was in college and a friend and I adopted a great big orange carving pumpkin, in October of 1990. We took turns caring for it, taking it to class, out for dinner at The 4B's, it went with us to parties, and even to movies. One day, in the middle of winter, our beloved Pet Pumpkin developed a a soft spot and toppled out the window where it landed on a ledge a story below and by evening was completely buried in snow. When the snow thawed that spring, all that was left of our pet was a dark orangey-brown mound of shell that eventually molded over and flaked away in the wind, leaving a permanent black mark that we would check on from time to time.

Now, every year, I get a new pet pumpkin, but none have ever been as special as the sweet little sugar pie pumpkin I got in 2003. I left my pet pumpkin in the office of the meat shop, where I was working at the time, and when I returned the next morning...

This is Barnes.

I found that magically (or at the hands of some silly sausage making boys) my pumpkin had been transformed into Barnes!

She was the Best Pet Pumpkin a Girl could ever hope to have!

We went to bars (she got me a lot of free drinks!) and parties and ski trips. Barnes and I went to work together, went on road trips, and met tons of new people.

She was a fun girl and I think of her fondly every year as the pumpkins are brought out and placed in piles...