By Tim Binnall
A Minnesota neighborhood has rallied around a homeowner who was recently slammed for refusing to remove her sizeable skeleton Halloween decorations. According to a local media report, the odd dispute arose last month when Arianna Davis was sent an angry anonymous message from someone who took issue with the out-of-season display on her front lawn in the city of North St. Paul. "Take down those creepy skeletons," the crudely scrawled note demanded, "or City Hall will write out a citation and penalize you." The somewhat unsettling missive also included the ominous "promise" that if she did not remove the display "we will make it go away."
Davis, an avowed fan of spooky season, refused to acquiesce to the demands of the furious letter-writer and, instead, shared the unfortunate development on a community Facebook page. In response, residents offered support by pulling their Halloween decorations out of storage in solidarity. Davis' neighborhood now resembles a scene one would expect to see around October rather than mid-March as skeletons of all shapes and sizes festoon several front lawns.
The furor even led to a fundraiser wherein around $1,200 was raised for a local food bank by way of businesses joining in on the fun. As for the anonymous critic who inadvertently sparked the strange frenzy in North St. Paul, they have yet to pen a response, though one imagines they probably regret raising the issue now that they are surrounded by even more of "those creepy skeletons." To that end, neighbor Rachel Thompson expressed hope that the mysterious writer may have something of a change of heart having seen "the love that this community has."