Opinion: Where have all the spookies gone?

Ever wonder where the ghosts and goblins go after the evening of October 31? You know, the ones who knocked on your portal or rang the doorbell last night and scared you half to death. The ones who demanded treats or else. Are they swallowed up by fissures in the Earth’s crust? Are they lurking in shadows, waiting for just the right moment to reach out and grab you?

The answer, I believe, can be ascertained by considering time zones. In 1884, a meeting of the International Meridian Conference was held in Washington, D.C. President Chester A. Arthur suggested that the various countries should decide on a “prime meridian” to serve as a “common zero and standard of time reckoning throughout the world.” The longitudinal line that passes through the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England, was chosen.

Known as the Prime Meridian, it is now used to determine time everywhere. For example, in the contiguous 48 United States, we have four time zones, giving us Eastern, Central, Mountain, and Pacific times, an hour apart from each other. Because the world is so large, when it is November 1 here, it is still October 31 in Central Europe. So, the spookies who terrorized us last night are likely skulking around the Eifel Tower, or Stonehenge, or Trevi Fountain, or even Frankenstein’s Castle today.