Some Scents Remember Things.

Not nice in the traditional sense, obviously. There are skeletons in people’s yards + fake severed limbs hanging out of trunks + an alarming number of decorative spiders involved.

But Halloween doesn’t really ask anything of you.

You don’t have to buy anyone a present. You don’t have to make a fancy dinner or travel somewhere or find the perfect card or worry whether you remembered everybody. You can participate as much or as little as you want. Put a pumpkin on the porch! Watch a scary movie! Eat sixteen miniature Reese’s cups! Turn your house into an elaborate graveyard! Wear a costume to the grocery store! Nobody cares!

It’s just fun. I’ve always loved that about it.

I love when the air finally starts getting cold. I love when the leaves change + suddenly every house on the block has a little orange glow coming from the porch. I love seeing how people decorate. I love that for a few weeks every year, we’re all collectively allowed to be a little weird.

When I was around 9 or 10 I think, I met my best friend.

Amanda + I grew up a few blocks away from each other in our lil' hometown on the lake, right near the Wisconsin–Illinois border. We were inseparable. We even looked similar enough that people asked if we were sisters, which, when you’re that age + have decided that another person is essentially an extension of yourself, feels about right.

She was my best friend through those weird growing up years + all the way up through high school.

And I was, um… not exactly a model high-school student.

I hated going to school. I skipped more than I probably should have. (If my parents are reading this: surely the statute of limitations has expired.) I actually almost did not graduate high school + was in grave danger of having to stay behind another year, which to me at the time, was absolutely not a viable option. I had a government teacher that sat me down one day + said "If you don't get your shit together, I'll be seeing you next year + I won't be this nice." So, I got my shit together in the last half of senior year + miraculously graduated.

Amanda + I did all the standard small-town teenage-girl acting out together, but she was also there for so many of the moments that quietly turned me into the person I am now. 

And every Halloween, we would come up with some goofy costume + go trick-or-treating — with special attention paid, obviously, to the good house behind the Jewel that gave out KING-SIZE candy bars. (Priorities.)

I miss her all the time.

I still see little signs from her here + there + I like to think she’s found ways to say hi over the years.

And somewhere along the way...

I originally made this scent because I love Halloween. Because I wanted something that smelled like October feels to me—smoky + sweet + cozy + mysterious, the season changing outside while you’re tucked safely inside. But after six years of bringing it back every fall, I’ve realized it holds something else for me, too.

It’s Amanda. It’s Horsefeathers. It’s two girls wandering around a small town when they were supposed to be sitting in class. It’s costumes + king-size candy bars + being young enough to believe October nights could last forever.

It’s a tiny time capsule disguised as a candle.

And maybe that’s another reason I love Halloween so much. For all the ghosts + graveyards + spooky things, Halloween has never really felt sad to me. There’s something strangely comforting about a holiday that lets the past hang around for a little while. We tell old stories. We become someone else for a night. We put lights in pumpkins + leave them glowing on the porch.

We remember things.

And we have fun while we’re doing it.

All Hallows’ Eve will be back October 1 for its sixth Halloween at Homebody.

And every year when I make that first batch + the studio starts smelling like October again, somewhere underneath all of it is a little:

hi, Amanda. 🖤