A Logic Not Our Own
Every year around this time, we talk about cutting down the tree. “It’s twice as tall as the house,” my husband says. What he means, of course, is, “I’m worried it will fall and kill us in our sleep,” which makes us peer around the trunk, looking for the tree’s innate logic — one we hope is stronger than our own. I am not inclined to make anything I love disappear. I think, instead, of people I should call on the phone, each hello or goodbye a leaf, evergreen as love, unsteady and oblivious to harm. — Vickie Karp
Mystical Mystic
The Ouija board’s planchette swirled gently. “Will I get married?” I asked. It glided up to “YES.” In 1995, I was 28 and newly relocated to Mystic, Conn. I had many deeper questions at this point in my life, but I did seek someone to love. “What’s his name?” It spelled out “F-E-R-D,” then circled lazily again. My friend and I laughed. “Who’s named Ferd!” Months past, the board’s message forgotten, when I was out at a bar and introduced to Ferdinand, an expat from Germany. We married two years later. — Judy Auber Jahnel
Same Frequency, Different Tastes
The cab I drove three nights a week in the ’80s had no radio. I kept a portable one on the dash tuned to WNYC. One night a Gregorian chant came on as I picked up two men and a natty young woman on University Place. “Turn off that dirge!” she shouted. I reluctantly obliged. Twenty years later in California, my wife came home to KCRW broadcasting a medieval motet. “Turn off that dirge!” she cried. I put it together: Maria was that passenger! Ex-New-Yorkers-who-officially-met-in-Los-Angeles, we share many commonalities. But our musical tastes still diverge around 1300 AD. — Kevan Jenson
Love at First Fright
Engagement photos at Spirit Halloween? Sure. Spend the night at the house that inspired “The Conjuring”? Count him in. See “Paranormal Activity” on Broadway? Obviously. We met on the cusp of fall, and horror became our love language. It’s mostly my thing, but Craig always leans in. Ghosts, haunted houses, scary movies — and one promise: Whoever goes first has to haunt the other. “Till death do us part” isn’t quite long enough for us. — Alex Aronson
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