Halloween in a hotel room

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The kids ran down the hallway looking for ghosts. On the door to room No. 212 at the Hampton Inn just outside Jackson, Miss., they spotted the white paper cutout of Casper's alter ego and stopped.

They heard rumbling when they knocked on the door before a loud but playful voice said, "There's no one here." The ghost and the football player giggled, their bags ready. The elevator dinged down the hall and a fairy and a cat, carrying hotel pillow cases, joined the trick-or-treaters.

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Suddenly the door flew open and PGA TOUR veteran Dicky Pride, hiding behind a grotesque mask, frightened the foursome. They were taken aback only for a moment before a chorus of "trick or treat" rang out from the group.

Pride doled out the candy with the practiced eye of a parent and commented on the elaborate costumes. Laughter and high-fives were exchanged before the search began anew.

Around the corner another door was decorated with a ghost, indicating that the room's occupants were fully prepared to greet eager young trick-or-treaters who were a long way from home. This went on for nearly an hour.

The last door we came to was on the top floor. When the door slowly swung open, Scott Hoch was standing on the other side. The man known at the golf course for his sometimes bristly personality melted like a Hershey's Kiss in the hot sun before his knee-high guests.

The year was 2000 and Hoch had already made over $1 million, which was a lot of money back then. Even traveling alone, he was still in the spirit.

Clad in jeans and a T-shirt, Hoch looked more like a hardware salesman after a long day than one of the best players in the world. But he invited the kids into his suite and put smiles on their faces and candy in their bags. He offered drinks to the adults and later joined the reception in the conference room.

From the lobby you could hear the mayhem in the conference room down the hall. Just inside the door a pirate dumped his bag and surveyed his bounty. Another pirate and a princess were in a fierce negotiation over the potential trade of M&Ms for Nerds. Even Henry Kissinger wouldn't have intervened.

The dads, some of the best golfers in the world, looked on, smiling and sipping a much-needed beverage while leaning against the wall next to their better halves. A few of the players' wives, recognizing that their little ones were missing Halloween at home, had organized this most memorable celebration at the hotel.

It wasn't perfect, but in many ways it was better because it was different. There were no jack-o-lanterns or scarecrows but there was a great sense of family and togetherness. A neighborhood of sorts was created that night -- kids and competitors and strangers all a long way from home, stuck somewhere they didn't want to be.

For some of us, it was the last tournament in what had been a very long year. Several players stuck around Jackson the next week to attend the second stage of q-school. But on that Tuesday night there were no thoughts of birdies or bogeys, wins or losses. It was all about the kids. But like most things that are all about the kids, I think the parents might have had just as much fun.

Every player competing in the Ginn sur Mer Classic has made unseen sacrifices to be on the Palm Coast of Florida this week. So have their families. Children small enough not to be in school may be there, too, spending Halloween trick-or-treating in an unfamiliar city.

The vast majority of dads, though, will be sitting alone in their hotel rooms, waiting for the phone to ring. Waiting to hear sugar-high voices describe in excruciating detail the events of a Halloween missed because dad wasn't high enough on the money list to be home.

John Maginnes is a columnist for PGATOUR.COM. His views do not necessarily reflect the views of the PGA TOUR.