John Pepin, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Journal columnist

“Mr. Diamond Sky tell me the truth, will there be any real satisfaction? Diamond Sky, oh well tell me the truth, are my wheels spinning closer to traction?” – Steve Forbert

The house stood ghostly white against the black night sky. Long, slender and pointed fingers of bare tree branches cast shadows across the wood siding, old-styled storm windows and the glass fitted tightly into the front door.

This was a big house that was situated now just off the top of the hill, a massive structure that had once stood a few blocks away but had been moved here — hard as that is to imagine.

There once had been a grand wrap-around front porch, the kind made for rocking chairs and hanging swings, warm summer days, cool lemonade and Old Glory folding in the breeze, hung from a pole on a pillar hook.

Inside the house, the power had been out for a few hours now. In the darkness, I shuffled around, amid the blackness, with a blanket wrapped around me, cold. The furnace was out, like the electricity.

Outside, the streets looked strange. Decorative city street lights produced nothing but stately silhouettes and long blue shadows that stretched across the lawn. Way out past the bay, from my window, I could see lights lit in homes up high on the hills.

The wind whipped sharply around the corners of the house, down the concrete sidewalk, across the street and through a thick hedge, dragging wet, crumpled leaves with it, rolling and tumbling.

This kind of night sends my mind spinning, wondering, thinking — all kinds of things.

Maybe it’s because I’ve got no place to go, and not much of anything to do.

Missing my record player, I wonder about our collective, more than casual, dependence on technology. Thanks to the old chandlers, a wax candle can still chase the darkness out of my room, while making me feel warm inside.

Like a moth fluttering around a back porch light bulb, I’m drawn to a flame.

Maybe it’s the orange glow of the light, something I’m seeing — but can’t explain — in the flicker or maybe I’m entranced by the exquisite confluence of this beautiful dancing form and her reliable function?

One good thing I can say about the power being out — the lights in the glittering firmament on those nights are clearer and brighter, making things seem alright. Seeing the sky like that over the city is rare.

This time of year, there’s a lot of focus — whether intentional or intrinsic — on the struggle between light and darkness.

Be it the old Celtic festival of Samhain — Halloween’s pedigree — which marked the summer’s end and foresaw the cold, dark winter nights ahead or kids trick-or-treating in the daylight after school to avoid the bogeyman, there’s a foreboding sense that the curtain between autumn and winter is about to tear, with the gales of November gathering just offshore.

This late October time seems right for ghouls, goblins, witches and owls, bats and specters — and why not?

The tricks and treats of my childhood October days are long gone forever, but their memory is preserved somewhere back there — like Monster Mash playing on a 45-rpm single — in the cobwebs of my mind.

The zombies were having fun. The party had just begun. The guests included Wolfman, Dracula and his son … Igor, you impetuous young boy.

Those were the days of writing on windows with paraffin wax, playing a Devil’s Night version of egg toss or pretending to play tug of war across a street as headlights approached over the hill.

There was also stuffing an old work shirt and a pair of pants with newspapers and then laying the paper bag-headed dummy in the middle of a dark road. We hid in the bushes, waiting to see cars stop and drivers get out.

We’d sometimes move road barricades to create an unintended detour. This was back well before solar-powered flashing caution lights. City crews used road flares that looked like cartoon bombs. They were black and round with an actual flame burning out of the top end.

Those gags were all harmless tricks few would dare to pull today. The world has changed so dramatically, with things like the bogeyman scary for real on just a regular Monday afternoon.

Things are so serious and ferocious, no one really plays around like that much anymore. Even innocent pranks are out of line.

Aside from Halloween, I still love the harvest time, with pumpkin pie, hot apple cider, dried corn husks, hay bales and jack-o-lanterns for decorations, corn mazes and cool evenings.

Nowadays, I no longer live in the big house just off the top of the hill. I find myself in a different place, trying to race winter by getting things done around the house before the big snows fall.

Today, I was laying down an asphalt shingle roll over the roof of a shed to add a few years to its life. When the girls got home from school, one of them agreed to come up and help pound in some roofing nails.

“It’s nice up here,” she said.

Before long, they were both up there with me.

They were telling me little stories about their day, their classmates, their teachers and their hopes for the days ahead. I loved being up there with them.

It reminded me of when I was their age and me and my brother would be off somewhere with some of the neighborhood kids, and some of my dad’s tools, trying to build a treehouse or a fort of some kind, somewhere.

In those days, parents let their kids out of the house as soon as homework was done, or all day on Saturdays, and didn’t expect them home until dark. If I did come in early, I’d expect to be asked why.

I imagine I would have gotten a swift boot in the pants back outside if I had said I just wanted to come in and play some games on the computer. Of course, we didn’t have home computers then, or YouTube or Facebook or anything like that.

We had Hot Wheel tracks, Matchbox cars, electric football games, G.I. Joe and Monopoly. We’d spend lots of time outside fishing for brook trout, riding and jumping our bikes, skipping rocks, playing football and, on weekends when the Miners Bank was closed, we’d play baseball with a hardball bat and a tennis ball in the parking lot. A black line across the back of an old warehouse, that’s still there, marked a home run.

We’d also get kicked off the big lawns of the Mather Inn, the Cleveland Cliffs Iron Co. laboratory or their land office for playing football on Saturday afternoons. The hotel was operating back then. There were sprinkler boxes sunk into the lawn you just had to avoid for fear of breaking an ankle. There were thorny picker bushes with red berries along the edge of the lawn. Eventually, everyone wound up tackled or rolled into those.

It’s so strange to me that all those days are long gone. All the things my kids did when they were young are gone too. So, what about these two young girls I’m helping to raise now?

I hope they take their time growing up, slowing down as much as they can to enjoy and experience their lives, enriching themselves as much as they can, taking time to look around to really see, hear, taste, feel and smell.

The night the power went out in that old house, the whir and the stutter of the lights, the television and the furnace kicking back on woke me up at about 3 a.m. I was under the covers, still cold.

I got up and made a pot of chicken noodle soup. It was out of a can and it was warm and delicious.

Minutes later, I was back in bed, falling asleep.

Outside, the world was spinning on faster and faster.

Off on the horizon, lightning split the sky wide open and through the pouring rain, tympanies of thunder rumbled out east over the lake — kicking up the water into a brooding and tempestuous froth.

Under the covers, I lay dry and grateful for the full strength of that big old house.

Editor’s note: John Pepin is the deputy public information officer for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. Outdoors North is a weekly column produced by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources on a wide range of topics important to those who enjoy and appreciate Michigan’s world-class natural resources of the Upper Peninsula. Send correspondence to pepinj@michigan.gov or 1990 U.S. 41 South, Marquette, MI 49855.