I remember my first Halloween in Southwood Park as if it were yesterday.

A little background: I came to Fort Wayne in 1998 from Massachusetts where I had lived in two college towns (although not simultaneously) for about 12 years.

College towns in western Massachusetts are not big on ostentatious holiday observances. A bystander or driver-by who likes to see Christmas lights on houses is hard-pressed to find examples of that holiday custom. I think I got five trick-or-treaters the entire time I lived there.

In the college towns of western Massachusetts, some people would rather be seen publically protesting a holiday (Columbus Day, especially) than be seen publicly embracing the trappings of one.

It wasn’t long after my arrival in Fort Wayne that I realized how different the Summit City is in this regard.

All holidays are loved unconditionally in Fort Wayne and each is celebrated to the hilt.

The first two neighborhoods I lived in here were Waynedale and Oakdale. Before I moved to Southwood Park in September of 2013, I thought I’d experienced the height of Hoosier Halloween hysteria.

But nothing could have prepared me for the way Halloween had achieved its quintessence in Southwood Park.

In Southwood Park, Halloween is like a block party that goes on for blocks and blocks.

It’s a blocks party.

Some homeowners transform their front yards into theme park-style attractions. Others haul out their grills and their coolers.

If you are a parent who looks hungry or thirsty or otherwise unfulfilled in life, you can expect to be offered a beer or a brat.

Diabolically decorated cars cruise around. Adults tend to be as extravagantly costumed as the kids.

There are moments you can look up and look around at seas of people in every direction.

It’s nuts in the best sense of the word.

It goes without saying that many of the families that participate in all this come from outside Southwood Park.

Some neighborhood residents are annoyed by that aspect of things. Some, like myself, adopt a “more-equals-merrier” mindset.

A Southwood Park Halloween isn’t for everybody. There are those of us who do not care to “look up and look around at seas of people in every direction.”

I get it and I respect it.

As for me, I didn’t really understand the adult appeal of Halloween until I moved here.

Halloween in Southwood Park is an annual opportunity for me to be comprehensively neighborly.

It’s like a town hall meeting – minus zoning squabbles, plus plastic fangs.

And it’s one of my favorite nights of the year.