Something magic happens when people pose for a portrait.

How they arrange themselves and their expressions tells who they are.

Scores of people came to our Enterprise open house for Altamont’s Victorian Holiday celebration.

Some said they came just to get the apple kuchen I make each year from my Gamsie’s recipe. One mother even took some of it to her daughter who couldn’t attend this year. And as always, more people asked for the recipe than signed up for subscriptions.

I love to share the recipe, to write it out in not so fine a hand as my grandmother’s — she had been a school teacher back when cursive was mandatory — but with the same precision and love.

It is wonderful to meet the people who read our words and look at the pictures we take and print on the pages of our newspaper all year long. Whenever I make important decisions for the paper, I try to keep a picture of the readers firmly in mind. That is who we serve when we seek to tell the sometimes difficult truth.

At the open house, we hear about stories we’ve written that have made a difference in people’s lives. We hear of pictures taken years, sometimes decades, ago that people have clipped out and saved. Being in the newspaper means something.

Many visitors asked about my health and I was happy to report a good check-up from Memorial Sloan Kettering the week before. Several shared stories of their own cancer, too.

Mostly, though, what people come for is the free portraits. Sometimes, a line of people waited while their kids decorated a cut-out cookie or two.

This year, Hilltown reporter H. Rose Schneider again patiently helped the youngest artists create their masterpieces with icing and sprinkles. Their canvasses were sugar cookies cut in perfect circles, which Rose herself had baked. Or gingerbread people baked by Guilderland reporter Elizabeth Floyd Mair.

Some people come every year to our open house. We have, for example, watched Emerson grow from being a babe in arms to an independent boy. This year, his wide brown eyes stared straight at the camera, his face resolute, his posture straight, as his parents, one on either side, supported him, their eyes creased with smiles. Click.

This year, too, I took our first portrait of a dog, Rufus, who posed with his master, Randy. Click. When I told my daughter Saranac who owns our newspaper’s mascot, Beulah the newshound, that Rufus might make a good boyfriend for Beulah, Saranac told me that was lame — why would Beulah need a boyfriend? Then she saw Rufus’s portrait — drop-dead handsome — and rethought the issue.

Nellie and Greg came, as they did last year, with a foreign-exchange student. This year’s house guest is a beautiful young woman, Rena, from Tokyo. Rena sat as they stood behind her, Greg’s arm around his wife’s shoulder. Click. Nellie told me that the origins of the the American Field Service foreign-exchange program came from the ambulance drivers who served during World War I and believed the exchange would foster understanding between nations, preventing war.

Later, their daughter Corrina came by. As a young teen, her picture was on the front page of The Enterprise as she shared ideas for youth activities in Altamont. Her beauty is still stunning. Click. She lives in Germany now, where she designs jewelry. She reminisced over her “partner in crime,” Elijah, a thoughtful, caring boy who died too soon. We had written stories on initiatives the pair of young activists undertook, such as getting vegetarian entreés added to school lunches or alternatives to frog dissection for high school labs. Corrina said she thinks about Elijah every day.

Gary, who had his portrait taken with his wife, JoAnne, told me that my father, an instructor at Whiteface, had taught him how to telemark ski. Gary stood behind his wife whose smile lit the room. Gary told me my father, who died earlier this year, was a legend in the Adirondacks. Through tears, I found it hard to focus my camera. Click. I was grateful my father was remembered.

Elizabeth and her daughter, Olivia, arrived in a vivid splash of color. They were on their way to Olivia’s piano recital but stopped long enough to pose in similar postures, each with her right arm gracefully extended, parallel without planning. Click.

Mary identified herself as Rhubarb Mary and I learned she runs the vegetable stand on Route 146, with everything homegrown. She and her athletic granddaughter shared the same smile. Click.

Amy was sure about what she wanted for her portrait. She was going to share it with her stuffed monkey, Banana. She told me she has read the Curious George books. Amy held her monkey gently, not too tightly, but with a look of pride. Click.

When Samantha and Jake walked in, I didn’t know if they were friends or a couple. As soon as they settled themselves for a portrait, I knew. Samantha sat in the chair and Jake knelt behind her, his hands around her shoulders, her hand grasping his. When she looked up and he looked down, their eyes locked. Click.

Rich and Mike came with the tools of their trade — cameras. Rich managed to take a picture of me as I took one of him. Click. Click.

Two grandmothers, between them, shared a beloved baby with a brilliant red bow in her hair. One grandmother’s kiss calmed the little girl while the other grandmother offered encouragement. Click.

Two sisters in bright winter coats — one plaid, the other fire-engine red — were completely at ease in each other’s presence. Click.

Best friends Natalie and Cass looked like they shared a secret. Click.

Sarah and Matt took the Victorian part of the holiday seriously. For a moment, with Matt’s top hat and Sarah’s hoop skirt, I imagined how our 1880s parlor would have looked at a party in the era it was built. Sarah said her fabric came from Joanne’s and her research came from the internet. The braids under her bonnet, Matt said, would cascade down her back if she let them. He knew exactly how far her locks would reach.

They posed with their friends in rigid postures with serious faces the way portraits looked when cameras were slow. Click. And then Matt and Sarah, bonnet to top hat, kissed.

Next year, I thought, I should hang mistletoe.

After the crowds had cleared — the train with Santa was coming! — I washed the empty icing cups, and scrubbed the sticky hot-cider spills off the floor. On my knees, I felt grateful. Not in any religious sense.

The wonder of an open house is all are welcome. It isn’t about Christians or Jews, Muslims or Hindus, atheists or agnostics. It’s about embracing all of humanity, anyone who walks through your door.

It’s about sharing the small talk and the big ideas. And that, I thought, is what a community newspaper is for.

— Melissa Hale-Spencer