Al Batt’s column appears every Wednesday and Sunday.

I go there to speak well of the dead.

I visit cemeteries often. Family and friends are there. I miss them.

My grandmother told me that cold temperatures chilled her to her bones. I recall going to the cemeteries with family members to visit fresh graves and experiencing a deep sadness when seeing the tears of loved ones. Those broken days sent forlorn feelings to my bones. My heart ached. When I was that young boy, I’d become quite good at using an eraser to remove the marks of pencils. You make enough mistakes, you become good at erasing things. I wished that I could erase the deaths of those I missed.

I’d be reminded by those in command that I shouldn’t step on a grave. According to superstition, stepping on a grave brought bad luck to the one who did it. A lot of the history of this superstition has to do with the fact that a cemetery was sacred ground and any incivility was a bad thing. Superstition had nothing to do with the admonitions I’d received. I was warned away from placing my feet upon a final resting place because it wasn’t showing the proper respect. It wasn’t appropriate graveyard etiquette. If I forgot my place for my feet and stepped on a grave, my mother would slit her eyes at me.

Recently, I heard a friend say, “Someone is walking over my grave.” He uttered those words in response to a sudden, unexplained shudder or shivering.

This saying derived from a folk legend that a sudden cold sensation was caused by someone walking over the place that one’s grave was going to be.

My wife, a sister-in-law and I made a trip to England. We visited lovely, ancient churches. It was impossible to move about without stepping on someone’s grave. Tomb slabs were part of the floors. Countless feet had walked upon those graves.

We stepped on graves and things were OK.

Halloween has interesting superstitions, too. If you catch a snail on Halloween night and put it into a flat dish, in the morning you’ll see the first letter of your sweetheart written in the snail’s slime. Now that’s romantic. People used to believe that owls swooped down to eat the souls of the dying. If they heard an owl hooting, they became frightened. A common precaution was to turn pockets inside out, which insured safety.

Halloween is a time of celebration and superstition. It’s thought to have originated with the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, a time when people lit bonfires and wore costumes to ward off ghosts. In the eighth century, Pope Gregory III designated Nov. 1 as a day to honor saints and martyrs. Called All Saints’ Day, it incorporated some traditions of Samhain. The evening before was known as All Hallows’ Eve and later Halloween. Halloween has evolved into a secular, community-based event characterized by child-friendly activities such as trick-or-treating.

To boo or not to boo, that is the question. All year, kids are told not to take candy from strangers. Then Halloween hits. People put candy in a bowl on the front steps or on the porch. If they are gone or too lazy to answer the door, they add a sign, “Please take one.” A friend’s kid took the bowl, reasoning that it was just one.

Popular houses give out full-sized candy bars. Not much Halloween candy grows old. Wise kids eat all the candy that their parents like the best before going home.

One Halloween, we had more fingers pointed at our doorbell than were pointed at the long johns at Quiram’s Bakery. A neighbor said that he had only one trick-or-treater. That one must have warned the rest. Not many kids wanted broccoli, air freshener trees and paper clips for treats.

I wonder what a real superhero dresses up like on Halloween? A neighbor lady donned a pointed black hat and a long black dress covered with light bulbs. Wait for it. She went as a lights witch.

I heard the story of a little girl who went on her first trick-or-treating adventure. After she had accumulated a bag of candy, she changed the process. Instead of holding out her bag at the door, she’d reach into it and offer candy to people answering the doors.

These are new times. We step on graves and we give candy to anyone opening their door on Halloween.