By Rebecca Swanson, Special to The Washington Post When I was a kid, October meant kicking your way through crunchy leaves in the front yard and making tissue paper ghosts to hang from trees. If you wanted a pumpkin to carve, you made your way to Cal’s Farm Market on 98th Street and walked down every row until you found the perfect medium for your masterpiece, which was gutted with sharp steak knives at your mother’s kitchen table. There were no pumpkin festivals.